So, who is The Traveling Mac and what is he about? What a question to tackle… Honestly, I really don’t know because The Traveling Mac was born on 03/10/2015… The Traveling Mac didn’t exist until a man named Daniel turned 40 years old… Let me tell you a little about this guy Daniel.

He was born in Chiswick, England. He moved to the U.S. when he was 6 years old with his 8 year old sister and 26 year old Mother. It was just the three of them and they were very poor. His Mother struggled as a single parent all of his childhood, trying to keep them well fed and educated. His father was basically a dead beat dad who Daniel has still not met till this day.

At the age of 9 Daniel got involved in theatre at a place called Prasilla Beach in Plymouth, MA and he loved it. He would act in many plays until he moved to NYC at the age of 24 to pursue an acting career. In New York he studied the Meisner technique at the Neighborhood Playhouse where he attended night classes while working at Carolines on Broadway, a comedy club located in the heart of Times Square. He would go on to do quite a bit of Off Off Broadway theatre but became extremely frustrated with his lack of success. He hated the fact that he had no control over his own destiny and was basically at the mercy of anyone who found him talented enough to cast him in their projects. Also he became frustrated with the fact he had to work late nights at the comedy club and pursue a full time acting career, which he was not making any money at, at all. He felt there had to be a better way of pursuing such a near impossible dream, so he started writing.

Daniel was always a writer, really. He journaled everyday and loved to get absorbed in his fantasy world. So when he wrote his first script, it came out of him with hardly any effort at all. He would go on to produce this script Off-Broadway, financing it with some family and friends. There he would get into the Actor’s Equity Union which prompted him to seek a career in film and television, considering you could join Screen Actors’ Guild automatically when you were in the AEA.

After 7 years in NYC, Daniel was finding he was getting distracted by the party scene and wanted to move on to the next level in his life. So he decided to move to L.A. at the age of 32. In L.A. he would do some auditioning but got even more discouraged considering it took so much time just to get to the audition and when he finally got there, they were always running late. He felt his time was more valuable considering he was also working a full-time restaurant job and free time was hard to come by. So he decided to pursue the writing career full-time and put the acting on the back burner.

This is when Daniel found himself truly happy. He was writing everyday from the moment he woke up and would work his restaurant job at night. Even though the economy was in a tailspin and he was struggling to make ends meat, he had his writing to rely on. It hardly cost any money to do and he was the master of his own destiny or so he thought. Daniel would go on to write seven scripts over the next 5 years, in addition to a full tv series. He was a writing maniac and was not only writing but making connections in the industry itself. He was so confident in his work he decided to shoot one of his television episodes he wrote from a series called “A Seat on a Train.”

During that time he went on to buy his own place in L.A, considering the prices were so low due to the recession. Now with a place of his own, a very impressive pilot filmed and a pretty secure job… you would think Daniel’s path to success had pretty good chances… but then tragedy struck. The restaurant that he relied on suddenly closed down due to the recession. Daniel then found himself with a mortgage, no job and a dream that had to be put on hold. Not being able to find a job, he had to rent out his place and move home to Boston for 8 months. There he would work for his Mother, who became very successful when he moved to New York, starting her own company. After he saved a bunch of money and the editing on his pilot was finished, he decided to give L.A. another shot.

Daniel wold get another job and try to get his television series picked up. The plan was perfect but little did Daniel know, that other obstacles would form and would stop him from pursuing his dream. From 2011 to 2015, Daniel would jump from job to job not being able to find an honest employer or a decent wage. Three employers stole money from him, forcing him to quit and having to find another job. On top of that, the new place he bought had turned into a nightmare. New tenants moved in and were extremely inconsiderate. Daniel’s morning writing, which he needed to keep him sane, was interrupted by dogs left home alone barking and children screaming all throughout the day and night. Not only was his work life a disaster… he got no relief when came home, having to listen to dogs bark and a neighbor’s kid who screamed until 1 am sometimes. So his writing suffered, not being able to write at all anymore.

From the moment he woke up he would be dealing with inconsiderate neighbors, financial worries and big Corporate companies that weren’t doing what they promised. He found his perfect life of writing turn into a constant battle with exterior forces that really had nothing to do with his life at all. Daniel became a bitter, angry, volatile man! He would go off on rants about his situation to anyone who would listen to him. He found his restaurant jobs becoming impossible because he was dealing with self absorbed rich Beverly Hills people who wanted the impossible. He would look forward to get out of work so he could go home and just relax, watching t.v… only to come home and be constantly bombarded with barking and screaming. He found himself dreaming of killing his neighbors and telling his rich clients what self absorbed idiots they really are. Basically Daniel became this hateful, negative, suspicious, angry person that most people didn’t even want to be around anymore, including his own family. It’s funny how when life deals you some lemons, we fight and fight to get our normal lives back. Well, Daniel did just that. He would get up everyday and say, “they won’t win! I will defeat them all! They will not take my perfect life away from me!” The more Daniel fought, the more impatient and volatile he got… His so called solution was not working and was just making him even more crazy! Daniel found himself getting into horrible depressions and not wanting to get out of bed at all. Daniel started to realize his situation was slowly killing him and if he didn’t do something about it soon, the inevitable would happen.

So, on Daniel’s 40th Birthday he decided he didn’t want this life anymore. The condo he bought suddenly increased in value due to new developments down the street. So Daniel decided to borrow against his profit, pay off all of his bills, rent out his place and get the hell out of dodge. The problem was that he didn’t want to move from one problem to another. He found that it wasn’t just his neighbors and job that were making him miserable, it was his way of life all together. He hated all the responsibility and working his butt off just to keep piling on more responsibilities. He found he was spending more time on the phone with companies that were supposed to make his life easier than actually enjoying what they had to offer. Daniel decided he had had enough and needed to get rid of all these obstacles in his life. So he decided after he turned 40 he would no longer wait on anyone. He had been working in the restaurant business for 15 years and had had enough. So he quit his job and decided to create a life that cost next to nothing to keep going, where all the responsibility he would have is writing and catering to his basic needs.

So Daniel went out and bought a used RV and decided to travel the country for a year. Daniel got rid of all the Corporate assholes in his life and consolidated his life into a phone bill, RV insurance bill and a Health Insurance bill. The only other responsibilities he would have is parking his RV somewhere, feeding himself and of course writing. He decided the world isn’t going to change but that doesn’t mean he couldn’t change himself to fit into this world. That was when The Traveling Mac was born and the transition began to take hold…

How are you doing folks? I’m The Traveling Mac… A little about me… I can’t tell you much, since I have only been around for two months. I am an experiment, created in one man’s mind… My partner in crime is a 32 foot 1996 Georgie Boy RV, named The Millennium Falcon, which I drove two hours to purchase considering it only had 26,000 miles on it. I have no bills, no responsibilities and my only task is to see this beautiful country and write about it. The rest will create itself… I don’t deal with any big companies, if I can help it and I have been given $7,000 to live off of for a year. Doesn’t sound like much does it? Well, it’s quite a substantial amount when you only have a cell phone bill and a health insurance bill to pay. The insurance on the Millennium Falcon I already paid for the whole year. So the rest of the money goes to food, gas and camping fees. Considering I plan on boon docking most of the time, my camping fees will be minimal.

I still share the same political views and ideology as Daniel, I just have a different way of writing about it. Just like me… my blog is in its infancy… So everything is pretty much up in the air. All I can tell you is this… if you want to hear the crazy rants of a man who grew up as a Republican in a small town, served six years in the National Guard, only to become a complete Liberal after living in three of America’s largest cities (Boston, New York and Los Angeles,) over the next 17 years, then you have come to the right place. I have basically experienced this country from many different points of view, way more than the average person, so it makes me a very open minded person. I have been a mechanic, a soldier, an actor, a tour guide, a waiter, a bartender, a pizza delivery guy, a writer, a director, a producer and even a landscaper. I have worked many jobs from horrible to bearable. I have definitely done and have accomplished a lot in the last 22 years of my life. I have been dirt poor yet I have experienced the finer things in life. I have been religious only to become an atheist and find God in my own way. I hate organized religion yet I live by the story of Jesus. Basically, the last 22 years of my life, all the hardships and the enjoyment, all the struggling and the easy going, all the bad and the good… has all been lived to reach this point.

Come and join me, especially if you feel this big weight on your chest that is suffocating you… I want you to share my journey with you, as I try to figure out my next chapter in life. I want to explore this great country and all the different people in it, trying to explain what we are all really about and hopefully making this country a better place to live. I am a man who cares about every human being in this world. I feel our culture focuses too much on money and success while ignoring the most important things in life, which is life itself. That’s why I have stripped myself of all of the possessions and responsibility that I feel clouds my views about this world.

Now, as The Traveling Mac with my side kick The Millennium Falcon, I will travel this beautiful country seeking the truth… where ever that may be… I hope you will join the journey also and maybe, just maybe, I will inspire you to make the needed changes in your own life… whatever they may be…