That's not true

It’s my freakin’ birthday weekend and we’re about to have me some fun!
Actually, no, that’s not true - we have nothing planned.

Actually, no, that’s not true - we will have FUN! Fun will be had wherever we find ourselves, plans or no plans, cause that’s just how you roll in #vanlife.

Take for instance the fact that we just finished having breakfast, here in our van, in our PJs still and with a view of Nuggets Casino (we’re camped in their lot). The meditative drone of trains, trucks, and automobiles on highway 80 has become just that - a sound among a number of sounds woven seamlessly into the tapestry of our van-lot home of the past 12 hours. And this is where we begin.

It’s Friday, October 5th, and I’m Ashleigh Moore.

(Hugh Downs voice) And I’m Joe Saponare.

(Together) And this, is Namago on the Road. Day 140.

Joe is standing at the foot of the bed, arms raised, grabbing at bags and clothing from his cubby hole closet above our pantry. Only 47 minutes ago, I declared that we must agree on leaving this place (the Nuggets lot) and beginning our day (destination still yet unknown) no later than 11am. It is 10:59am.

In this minute I am sitting on our king size bed, in my pajamas, with a pillow and laptop balanced on my thighs. It’s Friday, October 5th, my birthday is two days away, and this is the third Friday I’ve had off since my new work schedule began: 4 days a week, 8 hours each day. I’m still not used to it. (This is good! A pattern has not yet set.) There must be a way to maximize what feels like the most optimal work/life balance I’ve had in my 34 years and 363 days of life, and this might be it (pajamas, parking lot, traffic sounds) – no, really! This might be it. It’s hard to tell, we’ve turned things so upside down and around – it can be hard to tell what counts as absolutely making the most of it when you realize that the “it” was there all along. Perhaps obscured by the doldrums, but “it” was there – “it” is the thing you choose, the thing you create and decide – the thing to which you give your time. “It” is whatever you make it! “It” is the ever-present moment, ripe with opportunity and choice.

“It’’ is the fact that here I sit, still, at 11:22am, and there Joe stands, at 11:22, bare-chested and coffee in hand, and we’ve chosen this. We’re here, and 12 hours from now we’ll still be here. Well, no, not at Nuggets concrete lot again (I can think of a few better boondocking spots), but we’ll be here, in this present minute, with this rising inhale and with sounds of the external (the trucks, the horns, the birds, the skies, the people loudly chatting as they carry their “to-gos” back to their Toyotta Corollas and Hondas that sit parked beside our beloved home) – these sounds, seamlessly weaving their patterns into our ear canals, entraining us to the constant HUM of our shared space, making us so comfortable that

seven

minutes

later

and we have finished the coffee, Joe has moved on to a tech project, and here I sit, ready for whatever – ready to throw down the lid and turn down the sounds of these patterns and turn up the volume on something new – the chance to repattern the comforts we love and to go, once again, on the road, knowing that “it” is always with us, it’s just a matter of how we choose.

11:31 am

Our lifestyles of late

Sleeping in the woods or on the mountain for which the town is named and then working in town during the day.

Street camping uptown, and working downtown.

Stealth camping downtown, and walking up the street to work.

Camping for one or two nights at a State Park with facilities, and then using their showers and sanitary dump a couple more times that week.

We took nine

“We’re healing and we’re having fun.” We took nine. Almost nine out of nine lives to get here. What I’m saying is, in a lot of ways, it’s not easy. At least not always. This was one happy moment. We’re sharing it. But know, we’re not picture perfect. There are defects. We’re learning to work with them.

Do people on the outside have insight and see through our see-through veneer, our semblance of order, and see into the sweet significance of our mere getting along? This show, this performance, this faking it until we make it, if we make it, this perseverence, this keeping of appearances, this is enough, enough’s enough, enough already, it’s impressive enough just to be here and persevere.

An expletive belongs in here. “Fuck!”

Well, nothing is so severe.

Grace abides.