Who is this guy?

I'll tell you..............I'm a thirty-something, originally from the heart of urban UK, but now residing in the depths of rural France.

I wasn't always an artist. I once had what I considered a great job, working for a busy corporate identity company, under the somewhat dubious job title of, 'Project Manager.' I say dubious, as it was a title given to me when I'd one day asked my boss:-

'What's my job title? Everyone I know seems to have one, but what's mine?'

'Well,' he said, 'Let's think now..........................................How does project manager sound?'

'Sounds good to me!' I replied.

Of course, I really bought into this new status, despite being just one of two employees! The other two were my bosses, both joint directors of the company.

However, I was in charge of organising all incoming work, answering phones, working on monthly accounts, and most importantly, instructing and chasing-up a fleet of nationwide based, sub-contractors, which more or less listened to me, if they wanted our company to pay them. There were many other duties, but they’re far too dull/embarrassing to bother mentioning. What I will say is, it often felt like I was running the company single-handedly.

After five years a generous pay-packets and bonuses, the company went into decline, and I could see them losing money. I remember a year passing with hardly a new contract coming in, and it was certainly written on the cards that my job was in imminent danger. I did some detective work and found a redundancy payout would barely make one month's rent on my studio appartment (with shared bathroom). As a side note, the upside to this minuscule apartment, or should I say, room, was it’s sought after location which made it kind of acceptable, I guess.

To cut a long story short, unable to gain an interview for a new job, and fearing my the security of my current one to be pulled from beneath me, I'd made a snap decision to move to France...............I was single, all my friends were married with kids, and rarely kept in touch, and anyway, even if I did eventually find new work, buying a house in the UK as a singleton was near impossible.

I had family I could stay with across The Channel, and planned to set up a business selling my art (I'd had two eBay sales to my name at this point, selling 2 of 4 abstracts I'd created), and as art was the only way I could make money from very little capital, it was really my only option.

What better place to be an artist, than in romantic, bohemian France!

The plan was set, and giving in my notice to my surprised bosses (who I’m sure were hiding their surprise) had set it in motion.