PART ONE: Q & A
When you decide well before retirement age to quit your stable, hard-won, well-paying jobs, get rid of almost all of your earthly possessions, abandon most of your safety nets, and cram yourselves into a 38′ box on wheels, there will be questions. So many questions.
“Aren’t you too young to retire?” Precisely.
“Will you still work?” No, that’s what retirement means. I will retain my Surgical Tech credentials just in case, and we are also quite interested in doing various non-camp-hosting volunteer gigs at national parks and refuges, in exchange for which the parks provide full RV hookups. Win-win!
“If you’re not working, what are you going to do all day?” The same things we do all day now without the working part (hike, bike, kayak, cook, clean, sleep, eat, hobbies…)
“How can you afford this zany, madcap lifestyle?” The same way anyone affords any lifestyle. Work, plan, save, spend wisely.
“What are you doing with all your stuff?” We sold some, gave away the majority, and threw out the rest. Nothing is being stored.
“Where are you going first?” Soap Lake, WA. Then to Idaho to visit friends for a few days. Next, we’ll make our way to South Dakota to establish our new residency and spend some time at a few national and state parks we haven’t yet seen.
“Why South Dakota?” Because it is a full-time RVer-friendly state, allowing travelers to use their mail-forwarding address as their permanent address for licensing, etc. We won’t actually live in South Dakota.
“How do you get your mail?” We will use a mail-forwarding company. Whatever cannot be handled virtually will be forwarded to us wherever we are.
Then from South Dakota, southward on a slow crawl, weather dictating, probably ending up in south Texas for much of this coming winter. But don’t hold us to that.
“Are you worried about being together all the time in such a small space?” Yes.
“Are you taking your cat with you?” Unfortunately, no. This was a decision we absolutely agonized over. We know that many, many RVers successfully travel with their cats, but we also knew our cat better than anyone else, and we knew she would not take to RV life. To say that this was the most heartbreaking decision we had to make in this whole process is the grossest of understatements. She has found a wonderful new home with good friends to whom she is already warming up and where she will be greatly loved and cared for.
“How long are you going to do this?” Who knows? If we get out there, and it really sucks, we’ll stop. If not, we’ll go until we either don’t wanna anymore, or we are physically unable to continue.
“Do you need a special license to drive that thing?” Terrifyingly, no.
"Will you both drive it?” Yes. Why should only one of us have all the fun?
“Will you tow a car?” Yes, our 2014 Honda CR-V.
“Won’t you miss having a house?” We have a house. It’s just smaller than our old one and has wheels.
“Are you excited?” This was by far the most often-asked and the hardest question to answer, coming as it usually did smack dab in the middle of what was easily the most stressful time in our 20+ years together. When people would ask this question, their faces would be lit up with excitement for us, and I would feel bad that I wasn’t really feeling it. Even when big changes are those you voluntarily choose, they are big changes and change is loss and loss is hard. The bigger the change, the bigger the loss, the harder it is. So, yes, we are very excited, but we’re just now getting to the point where we can feel and appreciate that again.
Enough with the questions already!
PART TWO: Our First Full-Time Adventure!
I’m sorry. I have lied to you. I told you our first stop was going to be Soap Lake, WA, but we only traveled about 500 yards to the west of our old house and put up at the neighbor’s place. You see, I have work obligations through the end of the month, and we didn’t want to to leave on Labor Day weekend, so we will re-launch on September 4 and begin the itinerary outlined above.
The neighbors on whose property we are mooch-docking are the best neighbors in the world. When they heard that we had some time between the closing of our house and adventuring, they insisted we park at their upper barn which has a wonderfully level gravel pad, and which, with the help of another of our
“former” neighbors, we refurbished. We have an electrical hookup and use of their shower facilities, laundry, and free Wi-Fi. Did I already mention they are the best neighbors in the history of neighbordom?
TBG is officially retired, and cooling our jets here allowed him to get the new back-up camera installed today, and he will finish up the tire pressure monitoring system over the next few days. We have several more farewell coffees, lunches, and dinners with friends and family to be had, and a few more items to be offloaded before we raise the jacks and head off into the great wide open.
Twenty-six years ago, I took all of my money out of the bank, jammed everything I owned into my car, and set off from Ohio towards Seattle. I knew no one there, didn’t know where I was going to live, had no job waiting for me, cell phones didn’t exist, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. As it turns out, it turned out pretty great. It led me to TBG, and now we have jammed everything into an RV to wander around where we (usually) won’t know anyone, won’t always know where we’ll live, will have no job waiting for us, and can’t always get cell phone reception.
I have a feeling, though, this will turn out pretty great, too.
