I’ve lived in this hovel for six years, and nobody is forcing me to move.
For you see, before I purposefully quit my job and became a full-time squatter, I had a high-flying job as a business law firm in Melbourne. We’re talking CBD, office sixty stories into the sky, one of those glass paperweights that only really successful people have on their desk and a personal secretary.
Her name was Lacey. Really lovely, great at remembering dates.
BuT I wanted more, and paradoxically less. I knew a great deal about property law, but one thing I didn’t know…was how to deal with the real estate of my soul. I was dragged along to a convention by a friend from uni, mostly out of obligation, where my eyes were opened.I saw for the first time that it’s not about the money, or the power, or the expensive desk ornaments. You could have everything in life, if you stopped WANTING everything, you know?
Anyway, now I live in a hovel, and it’s great. I’ve set my sights lower. However, now I’m involved in legal proceedings with some former property law brethren who don’t understand my way of being. I understand that squatters are hard to clear out, but I’ve checked the documents. No one has claimed this building for six years and there’s been no significant development to the infrastructure. In fact, there’s very little documentation on the actual owner (who lived off in the Blue Mountains somewhere…), and it would appear that there’s been no significant correspondence in all the intervening time regarding the property in question.
In any case, considering this is a private building with no meaningful correspondence or claim of ownership, from a possessor who is now deceased, it could be a complex case.
However, this is also igniting my passion as a property lawyer. Melbourne needs me back in that position, in that office, with all the power and wealth. I wouldn’t WANT any of it. I’d just…have it.
-Kel