The train took it’s time, as it always does, I seated next to an older blonde fellow Pennsylvanian woman all too willing to impart her life’s story on my half-listening ears. Woe was her, a hard life of too strict parents, car accidents, abusive spouses, and prescription drug addictions. Her first husband, a good man by her account, had been a rodeo cowboy, they and their two children once traveled Wyoming through Arizona the rodeo circuit, until a car accident killed him and their daughter, forcing the woman to return East with her son. She nearly cried, 20 years later, as she told me how he was the love of her life, how they’d expected to travel and live together forever. Most recently, a stroke had left her unable to ride her cherished motorcycle and she now hobbled on a cain, massive pillbox in one hand, defeat in her eyes. I listened to every story, all 45 years or so of her life. She was an exaggerator, not quite a liar except for those she’d concocted to deal with her own addictions. We fell asleep in our chairs and I was gone before the morning could wake her.

There are few more satisfying situations in life than stepping off a train in the Austin, Texas early morning, a tent and a few spare clothes strapped to your back and the sound of the lighter as it sparks the tobacco rolled into your lips. I had no hotels lined up, and very little communication with friends in the area, the insecurity, uncertainty of it all as exhilarating as any acid trip. But without the hippie freakouts, of course.

Weekends of six packs with new acquaintances, dinners with oldest or dearest friends, cigarettes shared over late night conversations about everything but religion and politics or easy casual dinners about nothing but the two would ensue. After long months on the road, after meeting and exploring and readjusting, it’s immensely desirable to kick up your boots in the comfort of very easy conversation, familiarity the warm summer rain, the hot cup of cocoa on Christmas Eve.

This morning I climb 10,000 feet or so in the belly of a massive metal bird, bound for Denver where I’ll sleep under the Rocky Mountain stars and begin a thousand mile trip to my desert home on the back of a baby blue vintage scooter. This will seemingly be the end of an era for me and mine as we’ve decided to settle down the rambling on in favor of a simple life under the Texas wilderness sun. There’s an overshadowing sadness about that, but nostalgia–like it’s sister, longing– is best served in small doses and so I’ll do my best to make a motion of the moment as we hover over these clouds, into those mountains. Movement is natural, in our family’s blood, so to wish for it to come is as ridiculous as a tornado wishing it could spin or the clouds wishing they could rain.

1. Cheaper by the Dozen. That is, most RV parks are going to be cheaper if you book in advance. Even if you don’t get a discount at a park by booking a few days or a week early, you’ll at least have time to suss out the town and figure out which parks have the best deals on which days. I believe this is the difference between getting a spot for $25 vs. getting them for $39. And if you’re looking for $10 campsites, I’d suggest rethinking your strategy, because even though plenty of people we know and have talked to claim they’re out there, the cheapest site we’ve found that also had water and electric has been $15.
2. Las Vegas, NM vs. Las Vegas, NV. Okay, so my choice of locations here is highly subjective, according to my opinion, but my point remains: if you plan ahead you can do some research and find killer little hideaway towns that still have local cafes, roadside diners, town squares and friendly faces. If you just show up wherever, you may find yourself smack dab in the middle of wherever the hell you definitely don’t want to be. Don’t get me wrong, some of the best places we’ve ever stayed have been completely on accident (see Marathon, TX), but without doing some research, we’d have missed some real gems as well (see Bisbee, AZ).
3. The Joy of Planning. And last but by no means in any category deemed “least”, I have to admit that planning where we’re going next is nearly as much fun as getting there. The excitement of knowing we’ll be in a place like Austin, Texas or Portland, Oregon in a few days/weeks often keeps me up at night just imagining what it’ll be like when we arrive. It also gives me time to determine if the RV park we want to stay at is within walking distance to a healthy grocer, coffee shops, and bike trails, so we don’t have to unhook the RV every time we need a gallon of milk.

So What’s a Happy-Go-Lucky Spirit to Do?

Don’t be fooled, planning out your entire “year” (a reference to the “Oh, we’re going to live in an RV for a year.” statement which never holds true, everyone I know who lives this lifestyle has started off that way and just kept on going until they’ve had too many babies, bounced checks or too many busted alternators) is not only completely impossible (imagine the weeks it would take to organize that all at once), but improbable as well (the first time you hit a town you really love, you’ll likely find yourself scrapping plans to go to point X and just linger around a bit longer). We typically plan anywhere from a week in advance to a few months, the latter typically being something like “Well, we’ll head into the Southwest and then we know we need to meet Mr. So and So in Bakersfield on June 10th, so we’ll make our way in that general direction.”

All in all, part of the fun is taking your time, balancing out the planning and the just doing, and finding out what works for you. After all, your preferences may not be the same as ours. It doesn’t mean either of us are wrong, just that we’re probably a little bit more right. :)

I’m dreaming of settling down here, after traveling for another summer or so, there are still so many places I want to explore before we stop for good, or at least for awhile. Maybe we’ll be fortunate enough to get a fulltime spot in the most coveted park in all of Texas, with a little wooden porch and some lawn furniture where we can effectively double the seating capacity of our RV home, sipping beers with the locals and watching the wildlife dart up and down and through the pecan grove.

The traveling life suits us, and perhaps the fact that I’ve been laid up with a bum gut for the past month has helped me to forget how much I like darting from state to state, crowd to crowd, always trying out a new restaurant or circle of friends, but right now I’m feeling very much like establishing a homefront. Somewhere I can say I’m from. I’ll always be from Pittsburgh, probably spend summers there and take Obama’s new high speed trains home for Thanksgiving dinners, an occasional birthday or resurrection party. But right now, from Pittsburgh or not, moving every week or month leaves something to be desired: namely, a circle of people to just call up and hang out with. I’m not the socialite that Tristan and Olivia are, it takes time to meet new friends and seemingly infinite time to meet people who are actually friends; who you can feel comfortable in silence, call whenever you’d like without wondering if you’re bothering them.

Still, the traveling life does suit us, and that’s the beauty of settling down in an RV park…you lose the advantages of a home (namely space and a little comfort at times), but you’ve always got four wheels underneath you, ready to make a move again. A month on the road, how grand, particularly when compared with the week or two vacations doled out in my past, fully timed and employed life. Racing across the country on a roadtrip, an hour in St. Louis, a night in Utah, a fleeting weekend at Lake Tahoe.

To spend a month living somewhere you can really get to know the place. Certainly you can’t get to know an entire city in a month, but a small town is no problem. A neighborhood is simple. You can walk a 5 square mile area, every corner and cranny, in a week.

I like it here, and though we’ll be moving out of Austin in a few days, it’s nice to have something to look forward to coming back to eventually. The rain is taking a break.

Our return to Austin, greatest city in all of America. Spring is even finer than Fall, as memory serves, and the festivals are in full bloom this time of year.

When we first began our wonderful new life on the road the setbacks came in by the barrelfull. Our transmission caught fire only to be replaced by a faulty tranny, setting us back a month. Then Olivia’s back slipped a disc or two, another setback. After that, it was nothing but good times and open roads for the next six months.

Then I started to notice a bit of complacency about our travels. Even with the wonderful adventure that nonstop travel, seeing a new sunrise in a new town every week, meeting traveling circus hippies, loving welcoming families and every other sort of fellow gypsy, I was getting bored.

It’s so easy to take things for granted, to get used to something, as grand as it can be, so that you don’t see the stars right above you.

Three weeks ago I had a pain in my stomach, which turned out to be a case of appendicitis, which got infected. I’m still recovering, but nearly better. Another week or so and I should be back on the road, all bike rides and urban hiking.

All in all though, while I’ve been watching the leaves green, the swimsuits and bicycle kids on their way to swim in the local springs, I’ve realized just how good and precious life can be. It’s easy to get bored when things are good, but remember that rivers flow where the mountains let them, and you never know if it’s a placid lake or a waterfall around the bend.

Life has been full of surprises lately, and a few days ago this beautiful old relic of the hometrucking past came rolling in right next to us. I couldn’t believe my luck! It’s been a dream of mine to live in one of these beauties for as long as I have dreamed of living in a treehouse, but I never expected to actually see one from the 70’s still on the road.

The suspension is shot so these days it has a full entourage. The current owner is a really lovely, interesting guy who trails it to nearby festivals and runs a little coffee shop from it. His own matching hand-made truck top serves as his home on these occasions, his dog the most wonderful companion. Oh how I squealed with disbelief when I saw it for the first time! My heart raced. The add-on body is still in solid shape, and with a few repairs and replacements I could see her back on the road… me behind the wheel! hee hee

If you’re also nuts about housetrucks and housebuses, check out housetrucks.com.

Critics are hailing this episode as the least awesome yet, but comparatively, you won’t be let down. I get up on the roof and batten down the hatches as serious upgrades to the AC unit are performed.

Either way, it’s a rainy day in Austin TX as I cook up my usual breakfast of an egg, toast with vegemite, a cup of tea and an orange. I look out the window at a dark green truck. It’s a smaller truck, the type that you can’t necessarily haul much with, because the bed’s only 4 or 5 feet long, but it’s got the extended cab, so at least the family (or all of your drinking buddies) can fit inside. It’s got a beautiful and unusual deep green color and so I take particular notice.

I put an egg in a small pot, cover it in water, and start the boil. I get the toaster out and start browning a piece of bread. I put the tea kettle on and sit back down at my computer, readying myself for work for the day. Looking out the window, there the truck is, still sitting nearly in the same place, maybe having advanced five feet.

It’s 9:09am and rush hour is still thickly packed, which leads one to assume that they’re all late for work, for jobs they probably don’t like (if my history of job-having is any indication). Meanwhile, nearly everyone in the RV Park, seniors mostly, I’ll admit, but many of us in our 20’s, 30’s and 40’s, are slowly waking, if awake at all, hard boiling our eggs and enjoying our morning beverages.

Thank god for this life.

This video is from October 2008.