Last week marked the six month milestone of our life as full time RV volunteers. I must say it has been everything we imagined it could be and then some. Personal myths I had about the lifestyle have been dispelled and new revelations I never imagined have emerged.
As we make our way back to Iowa from our winter home in Texas Hill Country it is finally hitting home with us that we do not own property anymore. Yes, we are returning to Iowa and all that is familiar there. But ‘going home’ means something entirely different. It is now a concept, rather than a tangible place. We are lucky in that virtually all of our family is located within a 100-mile radius. Many of those we have met on the road had kids, grand kids and siblings scattered all over the continent. I have realized how incredibly lucky we are to have our kids and siblings all in the same place. That is what home means to us now. So, to those who asked me over the winter, “has it sunk in yet?” I can finally say, “Yes, it is starting to”. Do we have any regrets? Absolutely not!
One of the big myths we both shared about embarking on this lifestyle, is that the number of years we would do it would be determined by the number of years we were both alive and healthy. As we meet people we realize that death or major illness won’t necessarily force us back into a brick and mortar home, quite the opposite. We met many this winter who have been widowed and the common thought is that this was the life they lived, why would they change? They return to the same places as guests or volunteers and carry on. In some cases the RV was traded to something more suitable to a single person. But death of a spouse does not equal death of the lifestyle. We met others who carried on even though there was a major health issue with one of them. We spent 30 days next to a couple who had endured the husband suffering from some sort of infection that resulted in the amputation of his left leg just above the knee. He was working to perfect the fitting of a prosthetic leg and learning how to get around with it, while we were neighbors in November. It never crossed their mind to sell the RV and buy another house because of it. As a result of meeting these people and having ‘what if’ conversations with other Full Timer’s the conversations are more about what kind of RV will we get or what kind of work will we seek out, not where will be buy a conventional home. I’m sure there are some who would make the choice to come off the road, but we have found that we don’t believe either one of us will want that when the inevitable happens.
We have learned to keep travel plans fluid. Severe weather is a real threat when your home is not anchored into the ground by footings or a basement foundation. However, that is an advantage given modern weather forecasting and the fact that RV parks and campgrounds are plentiful. We put that into practice on our return trip to Iowa this spring. Bad weather? No worries, we’ll simply stay another day or take a different route.
I don’t miss gardening as much as I thought I would. The refuge allowed me all the hours I wanted working in their landscaping. I spent as many hours planning my new container garden and researching the nuances of that type of food production as I have in past years planning my garden in my old back yard. I am just as excited as any other year to start growing vegetables and flowers. My daughter and I have discussed building raised gardens in her new yard. Heck, I may get to do more gardening than ever as a result of our lifestyle change. Who’d have thunk it?
Champ, a prolific modifier and fabricator, has stayed plenty busy making tweaks and improvements to the RV. Even without a shop and all the modern tools, he has made all sorts of improvements to the RV. Building out custom storage areas, moving or adding electrical outlets to suit our specific needs. We even have a dedicated outlet with a switch inside to operate outdoor Christmas decorations! He does miss his welder, I think. There have been a couple of things that he couldn’t do. Not the least of which was we traded our truck just before heading south and our hitch set up was not compatible with the truck set up. Had he still owned a welder and had a garage it would have been an afternoon project to made the necessary modifications. Instead the welding shop couldn’t get the work done in our time frame so we had to borrow a hitch from a friend that was compatible and wait till we return home this spring to get the work done at home by a trusted experienced welder that Champ has known for decades. Good thing we have managed to convert most of our friends from travel trailer owners to 5th wheel owners. It was a huge favor, and much appreciated.
We’ll be ‘home’ in a few days. As we settle into our digs at Saylorville and get to know our new companions in volunteer village we’ll enter into the next six months without some old myths in our minds and an ever broadening outlook on our new lifestyle. We are so excited to see our kids and grand kids we are both about to come out of our skin. We feel something like the proverbial horse who can see the barn. The closer we get the more we want to get there. On the other hand, we have our Texas ‘job’ lined up for next winter and we look forward to returning to Texas with its warm weather and warm-hearted people.
The cats are enduring one last leg of travel home. They get stressed but recover quickly. Soon they will be in a new site and will stay there longer than they have stayed anywhere since we extracted them from their ideal cat life running in and out of the house at will, before they even knew what a collar was.
For now, the sun is shining and the road is smooth.
Until next time…
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