i was the wild card, the odd one out, never quite really sure of why i was there other than i had to meet my fate and my fear, these were real to me, i had adopted the warrior code although i was far from a warrior, i was just a happy go lucky adventurous open minded man who couldn't really do anything else. the idea of working for the man, in a bank or office just made me shrivel up inside, i had no interest in mechanical things, and no practical skills what so ever, i could not let myself work in menial repetitive factory work and i had no desire to take on anything ambitious or business like, this was it for me. working with people and their problems gave me perspective, it allowed me to feel relatively reasonable, that my own life was never as messed up as theirs and that i could just make it up on the run. i was smart and could talk my way out or into anything with all manner of people, i could leave them liking me and feeling good. that was my skill, big deal. 
two weeks into the training program i wanted to quit, what the fuck am i doing here i thought, listening to all this stuff, i can barely understand it let alone retain it and what i did understand i didn't like.
the sex offender is an enigma, completely different to clients i had worked with previously, their personality, method and crimes were fucked up and to be honest the only thing i found digestible was the coffee, i barely ate anything, i couldn't even sleep. i tried to focus my mind on the crossword or reading a newspaper each morning but my concentration just became infected with crimes we had case studied and the profile of pedophiles and children that torture and murder. i have a great imagination but it's not that good.
so i used my default option to daydream and look out the window and avoid eye contact with my peers who all listened actively and asked questions and generally intimidated me with their experience of the subject. they looked so at ease, comfortable as lydia lectured us on the peculiar personality traits of the children we would be treating. it was a rigorous month, statistics, myths, treatment theory and case studies were poured over us and it began to feel like the twilight zone episode they never showed. i really did feel out of place, in a room filled with phycologists, i began to think i was there by mistake.
in retrospect i imagine i must have looked like a total freak to these people, arriving in my strange outfits, with my nails painted and various women picking me up after each day. 
gradually i began to get a handle on the situation and my strange mind started building some sort of assessment, first impression images of these people. it's true we were all there for the same reason but it was hard to find anyone to connect with, something i have always had difficulty with but you would think in a situation like this the old dunkirk spirit would kick in, it didn't i had to really force it against my instincts which were screaming, get out of this, it's gonna end bad.
there was one stand out woman there called fifi who although looked quite stunning and sexy and i could not help but find myself imagining all sorts of inappropriate erotic thoughts about i actually found myself repulsed by her demeanour. there was something narcissistic about her personality and this made my whole interactions with her throughout the whole program quite curious as part of me wanted to fuck her and part of me wanted to slap her. she wore kinda sexy power suits and i could see her need to compete with lydia spilling over plus she liked attention from everyone, so i ignored her as much as i could but ironically this backfired, for she had me in her sights as a challenge and i was somewhat frightened that my defences would crumble given her provocative comments towards me later. i made a mental note to stay away but like all desire, my mental notes in that department kind of fell apart in the moisture of erotic need. i may be an up and coming spiritual warrior but i am just a man.
the other noticeable person was gary, who i liked immediately and felt i could relate to him. i knew he was an ex junkie, it's something that connects people subconsciously anyway, he smiled when i turned up wearing an iggy pop tee shirt and i figured him for a musician, i was correct. gary was a sweet guy, gentle and soft but like me trapped in a hard exterior. him and i became really good friends, i knew we would eventually but things like that take time for me, i'm slow and steady when it comes to letting people get close, always have been, which is why i have exceptional friends.
in some ways gary was the first casualty, but he was the smartest, he walked while we all sat in that car as it hurled towards a brick wall, he didn't even hang around to look at the car crash, he disappeared and in some ways i'm envious. i wish i had left with him.
the school teacher was a strange nervous type, mike. he was so serious, so straight. plus he was a christian type and he constantly attempted to make me laugh with his tame and very bad jokes, he presented like an eccentric boy scout and every time i looked at him it was hard not to envisage him in the uniform. but he did take a genuine interest in everyone, he really seemed to care for everyone and i guess was quite nervous about setting up an education program for the kids when they arrived. he was always keen to learn though and paid great attention to everything which was admirable as i pretended and spent my day imagining the surf conditions.
we were all nervous really, these were not normal kids, and the therapy was 24/7 which made the environment very artificial.
there was another person that seemed to stick out, caroline, an australian born lebanese girl who seemed to be some sort of academic. in her introduction she said she had a phd or something yet she behaved as though she was a teenager, totally free spirited, laughed all the time, shared the joy, very generous, would always bring in special cakes and sweets, generally just seemed to have a lot of spirit and was easy to be around compared to most of the others who were quite straight and unremarkable. caroline and fifi always sat next to one another and although they became friends, bonding in that girly way, every time my attention drifted and i found myself looking at fifi caroline would catch me and give me a cheeky smile. for some one with such an outwardly immature disposition caroline was the smartest of us all, she was one. i wish it wasn't her. how i wish it wasn't her.
there were about ten others, all players in this story but they don't have the kinda roles that would make interesting reading, suffice to say i was in a room with a bunch of experts being trained on sex offender treatment therapy by lydia and yes, it was as uncomfortable as it sounds.