I’m sitting in the apartment on The Red Couch (capitalized because it’s the most expensive thing we’ve bought, a whole $100), very early in the morning during a thunderstorm.
Tracy is sleeping and Banjo is anxiously sitting by his bedside, but, here in the school-spirit red living room, I’ve opened the vertical blinds to the sliding glass door so I can watch the lightning and rain. I would open the sliding door and sit out there, but is that weird? Do people sit at 5 am on their publicly visible first-floor balconies in their pajamas, typing during a thunderstorm? There’s a lot I have to relearn about apartment etiquette.
Moving was hard on our backs and tricky (due to the badly timed apartment repaving project), but it seems to have been a success.
The Airstream is still sitting in the campground, entirely empty, waiting to be towed by someone who was contracted by someone else yadda yadda—we don’t know when or how that will happen anymore, so there it sits.
Tracy took this last photo after he was finished unhooking power, draining waste water, pulling electrical connections he’d made for the StarLink system, etc.
Here’s what she looks like empty.
Nearly lifeless, but oddly inviting—clean and devoid of our five years of clutter. I can see why I was so eager to move in years ago! (That box on the stove is manuals and remote controls that go with the trailer.
Making the Airstream Grow
The magic spell that made the Airstream grow was packing everything up. I filled box after box after box, and as soon as I thought I was done with one area, I’d find a bunch of stuff crammed in behind something and had to start up a whole new box. The Airstream was like a clown car, with an unbelievable amount of clowns pouring out.
When we first arrived at the campground months ago and got the storage unit, we unloaded the trailer into storage many, many times, so when it came time to unload it again with the stuff just for the apartment, what a shock. There was more stuff.
What’s funny is that the Airstream shrinks when you want to put something in it. Buy just one small purse and try to find a place for it inside? “No can do,” says the Airstream. It shrinks up tight and refuses admittance.
Ah well, that mystery is behind us. Now it’s on to:
Dealing with a Shrunken Apartment
You’d think the fact that we owned no furniture, very few kitchen items, literally threadbare clothes—that all of that would spread out in a new, empty apartment easy peasy. Well, ALL THOSE5 BOXES and ALL THAT SCAVENGED STUFF have filled this apartment so quickly that it’s kind of revolting. How did we become Owners of Products in the blink of an eye?
As with any move, the boxes are still piled up where you have to step around them, and we’re still looking for vital items buried somewhere. Like, that Bluetooth room speaker we bought at Goodwill is too large to have been overlooked. Where is that thing?
Now, this apartment seems to have great storage in it. There’s a big coat closet, but we’ve crammed it full of outdoor gear and bins of dog supplies and hiking boots and rain boots and all those random things you don’t know what to do with.
There’s a walk-in bedroom closet, but we own crap like a kazillion backpacks and sun hats and (okay this is just me) crafting supplies. You can’t walk in our walk-in closet right now for all the stuff.
Even the bathroom has oh so many cabinets but we have oh so many first-aid items in case one of us falls off a cliff, and a million old dog towels for those times Banjo had to come in the trailer after a muddy walk. To top off the confusion in the bathroom, the one shower curtain we own is too short and narrow; it’s the one our nomad friend Sherri hemmed for me when I broke the Airstream shower door (the first time).
We are weirder than this apartment is built for, is what I’m saying. Which I guess is to be expected.
The good news is that Banjo is accepting carpet as a decent substitute for grass.
Next up (other than trying to sort all the Airstream stuff in the apartment and overseeing the Airstream departure) is waiting to see what happens with an offer we made on a house. This will be our third house offer, and maybe three time’s the charm. And maybe this will be the house for us, because it is very weird.
We didn’t get your 5 a.m. thunderstorm (radar showed it west of us, over Madison), but I was awakened at 1:30 a.m. by thunder and lightning. It occurred to me that this was actually the first time all year we’ve had a middle-of-the-night storm, which is surprising. Usually we’re good for a few of those every summer.
You can probably get rid of a few of those first aid kits since your odds of stumbling off a cliff have drastically diminished now that you’re city dwellers.
Indeed you are right sit with your first aid kit advice. There’s a lot of rearranging of goods I need to do: out with the outdoors, in with the indoors, I guess.
As I was unpacking after 6 weeks at my mom’s house, I realized how often I play Jinga with items in cabinets and closets in the Airstream. I think we live minimally, but these trailers sure can hold a lot of stuff. It was a bit weird getting used to the larger house, and after 6 weeks, it has been a bit weird readjusting to the 25ft trailer. Good luck on the 3rd home offer! All good things come when they are supposed to arrive. If this one doesn’t go through, then the home that is supposed to be yours is still out there waiting for you and Tracy to find it.
I bet that was super strange for you to move back and forth between the tightly-packed world and the spread- out world. What an adjustment, over and over!
This is a big adjustment, no doubt. And I’m sure after a little sedentary living you’ll be thinning out some of that bulky outdoor gear.
I love the mental image I’m getting of the airstream sucking in its stomach and saying, nope.. no room for a purse in here. 🤣
My fingers and toes are triple crossed for your house offer to be accepted. Weird is right in your wheelhouse.
😉
Thank you – I’ll take weird as a compliment!!
That’s how I meant it!
💕
You didn’t suspend that speaker from the ceiling of the airstream, somewhere over the drivers seat where it still hangs? 😆
Your tale makes me think of the issue of “time” in retirement! I get less done in general because I allow more time to do stuff, because I can. When you work, you have to be efficient with how you spend your time, like storing stuff in an airstream. Then you retire (or move to larger quarters) and spread out. Cue Mo, Larry, and Curly.
Ha about the speaker idea! People leave the strangest things when they move, I’ve found. No, this is a large speaker, and we finally found it in a large box.
I know just what you mean about time expanding and contracting. You are right about this being the exact same phenomenon. I guess that’s where the saying comes from that if you want something done, give it to a busy person. I guess if you want something stored, put it in an Airstream!