Traveling – A Bevy of Books

Joy and Stillness

Flathead Lake, Montana, bevyofbooks.com — Flathead Lake, MT

Still.

I am sitting very still – metaphorically speaking. Day 7 in Seattle, and the stormy weather forecast has discouraged all the vague ideas I had about driving to the coast or going to visit people in Portland. And so I am sitting – with tea and a book – and looking back at the last few weeks in awe.

One week ago, I was driving from Hungry Horse to Seattle. Two weeks ago, I was on day three of driving from Cleveland to Hungry Horse. Three weeks ago, I was driving from New Hampshire to South Carolina. Four weeks ago, I was in New Hampshire. Five weeks ago, I was in New Jersey. Six weeks ago, I was driving from Cleveland to Philadelphia.

Somewhere in there, I visited New York City, a beach in Rhode Island and knocked four more states off my list. I spent time with both sisters and their families, two cousins and their families, one aunt and uncle and several great friends. I stayed in six different homes and 11 different hotels, traveling through a total of 23 states (nine of those in one day, thank you tiny New England states) and put more than 6000 miles on my car.

Manhattan, Staten Island Ferry, NYC, New York City, bevyofbooks.com — Manhattan from the back of the Staten Island Ferry.

No wonder I’m tired. No wonder I’m excited about getting a regular job and finding an apartment of my own. Even the idea of having to get up IN THE MORNING five days a week hasn’t made me question my decision to stay in one place for a little while.

I got to take public transportation to three interviews this week – someone else did the driving! I got to shop at Fred Meyer, where they have both my favorite tea and my favorite sausage! Street buskers, gorgeous views of Elliot Bay, funky residential areas, pedestrians! I actually unpacked my suitcase!

Tea and a good book. Stillness and joy.

Betwixt and Between: What do I do now?

Rhode Island, Atlantic Ocean, beach day, bevyofbooks.com — Probably my last beach day of 2016, Rhode Island coast.

I’m almost out of money.

The smart move is to head back to Montana and stay free with my sister, get a job and return to the story of work and home and a settled life. Or that same scenario, but back in Portland where I have a support system and more professional connections.

Winter is coming. No, not Winter is Coming, nothing ominous here. Just snow and cold and studded tires and windshields that must be scraped. Montana has winter, the real stuff. I will not be actively choosing to winter anywhere that knows what that word means.

Returning to Portland would feel like coming full circle – which wouldn’t be bad, but it would feel like the end of this story. And I’m not ready for that ending just yet.

I am a little tired of not having my own space to return to. I might be spoiled for ever living with anyone long-term ever again. I just want to wake up in a space where no one intrudes without invitation, regardless of how much I might love the intruder. That means some kind of place of my own, even if just for six months or whatever. But while I am looking forward to not being a ping-pong ball, I did still want something new.

So I’m going to Seattle in two weeks. West Coast feels like home, Seattle is on the water and near the ocean and has very little winter. I have a friend there who’ll let me crash while I find work and I can take the train back to Montana for Christmas. And if it all tumbles down around me, both Portland and Montana are close enough to crawl back to and lick my wounds.

So here I am in South Carolina, sitting in a new place with not-new people, headed down a well-traveled road with a new adventure at the end of it. At least, what in my head seems like a new adventure. I’m looking forward to it.

So. Many. Questions.

Everglades National Park, bird, bevyofbooks.com, Florida

How long are you going to do this?

I’ve been getting this question a lot recently. Maybe because this is my first trip to Florida since I quit, and these folks haven’t had a chance to grill me yet? Maybe because I’ve been doing this for almost a year now? Maybe because the space-time continuum calls for it? I don’t know.

Regardless of why, it’s an interesting question. How long *do* I want to do this? My standard answer is, until I get tired of it or I run out of money – and I’m betting on the money running out first. I’m supposed to be working on finding more location-independent income, and I’m on a few lists, but I really should be doing more. But working in Portland this winter reminded me how much I do not want to go back to a nine-to-five.

How long has it been?

Another good question. Homeless? Since Feb 1, 2015. Stationary-jobless? April 3. Out of Portland? April 11. On the road? May 10. So when do I start counting, exactly?

For me, the important dates are April 3 and May 10. April 3 was the day it was really real. I’ve quit a bunch of jobs in my life, but never with this kind of intention. I quit to move somewhere else, to make more money, to go back to school. I’ve been fired and laid off from permanent and temp jobs. But I’ve never quit with the idea of changing my whole life. That last gig was the best regular job I’ve ever had, in every way. But rather than making me happy, it made me realize that I’d never be happy doing that kind of thing, I’d only ever done it because I had to. And now that I don’t have to, I’m going to try and see if I can find a way of living and earning my way that makes me happy.

May 10 I left Great Falls with everything I thought I might need in Little Red, and no clear idea when I might return to home base. That feels like the real beginning of this… whatever it is. It really needs a name. Trip? Adventure? Insanity? So it’s been 11 months, and I’m nowhere near ready to stop, regardless of the challenges along the way.

Everglades National Park, osprey, Florida Bay, bevyofbooks.com — Maybe I’ll move in with these ospreys on Florida Bay.

Will I never have a real job again?

Who knows? I’m hoping not. But the idea that a different life is possible is a really good reason to try something else. I’ve made plenty of risky choices in the past with regards to jobs and whatnot, and all those were really in the service of paying off my debt. Now I get to use those skills in the service of a joyful life.

Where to next?

I’ve got to get back to Montana by the end of May, so I’ll be heading back north in a week or two. I’m thinking about going to the Science Fiction Writer’s Association Convention in Chicago mid-May. Maybe I’ll see some of you on the way.

Next steps: Searching for the YES.

Fireworks in the snow on New Year's Eve. — Fireworks in the snow on New Year’s Eve.

I’ve got a lot of things swirling in my head lately. Three weeks of downtime in Montana – where the area is utterly familiar (and beautiful) and the weather has discouraged me from wanting to go out – I’ve been evaluating my nine months on the road and what I want for the immediate future.

I’m not coming up with any good answers. I’m thinking about things like going back to work full-time or going back to work part-time so I can go back to school. Searching job openings in cities I’ve never been to.

It’s mostly just a mental exercise… a reminder that I really can do what I want, which means not traveling, if that’s what I decide. Nine months of travel is making it feel like a chore, when it was supposed to be a joy. Not enough time to myself means I’m moody and not always pleasant to the people around me.

These were my choices. Which means I can choose something new tomorrow. I don’t know why it’s so easy to forget that, but it is. Everyone I know does it, either occasionally or all the damned time. Some people even deny they ever had a choice (those people I mostly choose not to spend time with).

My biggest challenge this year has been choosing to spend money. It’s the biggest reason I haven’t spent enough time alone. Being alone almost always means spending money on lodging – the most expensive piece of most travel budgets. Yes, there are ways to save on the cost, and I’ve used them, but it’s hard to beat FREE, which is what it costs to stay with friends.

But I had seriously underestimated how living completely alone for five years had fed my love of solitude, making it even more important to my emotional well-being. Ask anyone I’ve stayed with this year, my favorite thing is to wake up in an empty house.

My lack of awareness, and later my denial of this need to be alone, means in the choice between saving money or saving sanity, I chose to save money. But that choice is no longer sustainable, so I must make new choices.

I don’t know what that looks like yet. Right now I have another opportunity to fill up my savings account, so that means I’ll be in Portland for longer than expected. Most of my mental swirling has been shifting from ‘how do I save money?’ to ‘how can I make more money?’

I know one thing. I’ve spent many years now trying to follow my heart, the voice in my head, the pull that tells me what I really want and what I can do. And every single time I’ve listened hard and believed that what I wanted was attainable, the fates have dropped that shit right in my lap. Jobs, career changes, housing, friends, travel. When my heart and mind would both give a big YES to a risk I was taking, it would all turn out even better than I’d hoped.

And on the flip side, every time I’ve ignored the big NO that comes with a bad choice, I’ve regretted it. I’ve spent years and tears trying to get back to a YES. I really have gotten much better at hearing that NO, I can tell you.

But you get busy with the day to day crap, and you forget to check back in with that YES and see if it’s still there. Make sure you haven’t wandered off, following shiny things, and lost track of what you were doing. To make sure that it’s not been fulfilled and time to find the next one.

So I’m looking for the next big YES. And looking forward to what will come my way.

A Temporary Return to The Grind

Redwoods California, Bigfoot, bevy of books — I’d rather face Bigfoot that go back to work again

I’m back in Portland for a few weeks, refilling my savings account with a short-term contract job that was too good to pass up (which made the Frugal Franny voice in my head SHUT UP for the first time in months). And while the work itself is not any worse than it was five months ago, the experience of working is a seriously unpleasant shock to the system.

I was exhausted for the first few weeks – a combination of greatly increased mental efforts (finding and fixing a crazy quilt of errors on the project) and not having adjusted back to a work-supporting schedule.

I said yes to all the social invites I received – as I would when I was just here visiting – and as a result did not have one day in the first ten where I got enough sleep. I had a lot of fun, but I was wiped out.

I make jokes about the oppression of work and the rigid schedule it imposes on your life… but it’s not really a joke. Most people are just so acclimated to that schedule as a way of life that it seems normal, and therefore unavoidable.

I spent months with no particular schedule on a daily or even a weekly basis. Other than having payroll deadlines to be meet twice a month, my hours, days, weeks, meal and bed times were my own, to organize or ignore however I liked. Often, those would be heavily influenced by the people I was living with and travel I was doing… but all of those things had also been chosen or determined by me.

Redwoods California, trees, bevy of books — My preferred view.

I don’t think I have the words to properly convey the joy I took in reminding people that – while they had to go to work tomorrow, go to bed early, leave before the show was over – I did not. I’m quite certain a few people were sick of my shit, and I don’t blame them. But it was often as if I was realizing it for the first time. I DID NOT HAVE TO PLAN MY ENTIRE EXISTENCE AROUND THE NEED TO BE AT MY DESK AT 9AM MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY.

Because it really does take up WAY more time than those 40 hours to be a good worker bee. Commuting time, wardrobe maintenance, meal planning, hygiene, daycare or pet care – the time to manage all of these activities is greatly increased (and sometimes only made necessary) by the demands of a job outside the home. Not to mention the additional work many of us bring home and the stress induced by all of the above.

So now, here I am, week three of this project, and I’m right back where I was in March. Not ‘what do I want to do today?’ but ‘what do I need to do this weekend so I can go to work on Monday (grocery shopping, laundry, etc)?’

But I don’t have to work Monday – I’m off to Montana for a week. A fact which has been virtually invisible to me for the last two weeks as far as daily planning is concerned. Vanished. Overwhelmed by the unaccustomed demands of the work schedule.

A schedule I have to remind myself will be gone again very soon. Intellectually, I know I’m running off again in early October – but viscerally, I feel like I’m back to working a real job again and next week will look just like this week, and on and on forever. And, having recently been removed from that mindset, its return looks like the tyranny that it is.

A rat race most of us have acclimated to. A thing I’m hoping to leave behind forever.

Gold Beach Oregon, bevy of books, ocean — This isn’t me, but I plan to be this guy in two weeks.