Today’s a full-on rainy, cold day on the southern coast of Oregon; we’ve been stuck inside for the good part of three days. I’ve finished my tiny house; ukulele seems like too much effort (lol, imagine that!); and our cell signal is slow and weak. So, it’s a good time to fill you in on the […]
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Am I on Vacation?
If you’re lucky enough to have been able to take a vacation, you know that the whole point is to be away from regular life. You want to be physically away, in a new place, where you can forget about your usual worries, where you get out of your routine, where normal life is suspended. If you’re lucky […]
Beauty and the Stress
My friend Whit shared a NYT article with me yesterday about the contrast between the shiny social media portrayal of #VanLife and the sometimes-miserable day-to-day reality of constant life and travel in such a small space. You guys know this is a multi-layered theme for me here. It’s easy to make fun of the trendy […]
We Are All Caricatures of Ourselves
When we were in Texas, I mentioned this quote (by my sister’s friend), referring to Texans. The sentence in full—that I love so much—goes, “Texans are caricatures of themselves and they don’t even know it.” It turns out you can find people and places that exemplify caricatures all over the country. Texas is just an […]
Blogging in Dark Times
As I write this, I’m thinking about the war in Ukraine. Yet, almost two years ago, I wrote about the weirdness of “living on vacation” and writing about it when the rest of the world seems like it’s on fire (George Floyd had just been killed). I’ve blogged about my nomadic life during the worst […]
Why Do People Come Here?
I’m still mulling over possible reasons. They should be obvious, but I can’t wrap my head around it. Here’s a quick recap from my previous posts about Imperial Dam LTVA (long-term visitors’ area). Cons That pictures above is not of the LTVA, although I snapped it while I was taking the trash to the dumpsters […]
Balance Is a Seesaw
From Bruce Springsteen’s “Growing Up.” on Asbury Park, 1973: I took month-long vacations in the stratosphere, And you know it’s really hard to hold your breath. I swear I lost everything I ever loved or feared, I was the cosmic kid in full costume dress. Well, my feet they finally took root in the earth, […]
Death by Paper Cuts?
That’s an exaggeration—in both directions. We’re still loving this lifestyle (so, far from death), but we’ve faced more than just paper cuts lately. An older guy dumping his trailer tanks at the truck stop next to us was just hopping to tell me that he’s sold his house and bought this RV and is going to […]
Perpetual Stranger in a Strange Land
I’ve a friend who lives in her Airstream but travels less than we do; she and her husband own a parking pad in a little Airstream community that they use as a home base. So we share quite a bit in terms of lifestyle, but we also live very differently within that lifestyle. What’s funny is […]
Lessons from Isolation
Tracy says it’s been ten days only that we’ve been camping without cell signal, and in truth it’s not been more than two consecutive days, since we’ll drive out to download email pretty frequently. But when I check my calendar and my social soul, it feels for sure like three weeks. Maybe all summer? When was it I […]
