Hitchy Feet
Reviewed By Janet Mawdesley October 8, 2014
Author John Card
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ISBN: 978-1925048179
Publisher: Finch Publishing
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Website: http://www.finch.com
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When John Card turned thirty-something, he decided his life as he knew it was going down the gurgler, but what to do about it was the issue. He was tired of trying to hammer science into the heads of high school students who would rather be doing something else, living with his parents, all the while dreaming of doing something different. But what to do next was the real question.
The different turned out to be applying to be trained as a radio broadcaster and while waiting for an interview, hitchhiking around Australia with visions of being mobbed, murdered or robbed as he picked up lifts to see him to the next town a common thought pattern.
On his way around he tried to work out just what had gone wrong with his life, finding the learning experience hilarious, entertaining, dangerous and at times seriously hung-over.
Somehow or other, despite his better intentions he managed ‘to get a life’, meet a wide and diverse range of people, took on seriously challenging work at an chicken farm transferring chickens from one cage to another, I kid you not, and rooftop surfing while traveling at 120K’s an hour in the Western Australian outback.
He is offered lifts by a range of ordinary or not so ordinary people from place to place and sometimes all the way between cities, learning much on the way. Several times, while sitting in the baking sun for hours waiting for someone to take pity and offer a lift, he doubted what he was doing.
Spending serious time in reviewing just what he thought he was doing he discovered the dessert is a great place for introspection, particularly while the bugs and ants are determined to make their bed your sleeping bag. He also discovered that life, like the dessert is full of the unexpected.
Eventually making it into Perth in time for his interview for the radio announcing course at WAAPA, he had to face the hard facts of life that he had been rejected from the one thing he desperately wanted to undertake. He also needed to return to his home town in Victoria as time for travel and rediscovery was almost up.
In his 15,000 kilometre round trip John learned much about life and living; deciding that while you travel certain pathways, fall into a career, or even two even the life of a penniless writer, trainee radio announcer, (he eventually made it into the Swinburne Radio Broadcasting course,) relief teacher and occasional stand-up comic was his for the taking.
John had come to the monumental discovery that he could live his dream as it was all there simply by believing in himself.