Personal

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Pecuniary Shyness, or This is Real Life!

Some RVers like to talk at great length about their finances, to the point of splashing out for all to see their balance sheets. I made a decision early on to gloss over this topic because I realised early on that full-time RVing is real life. Let me repeat that: full-time RVing is a lifestyle choice, not a perpetual vacation. Everyone’s reality and circumstances are different. I don’t see any value in going into any sort of detail about my financial portrait.

This issue has come up several times over the past few days. I’ve had someone comment that I ‘owed’ it to other RVers to explain how I get by day to day financially so that they could emulate me (!). Another person was appalled that I ‘steal’ from the thrift and free stores since I’m obviously well off, with a ‘nice motorhome and recent model car.’  Another doesn’t get the difference between being ‘tight’ (choosing not to do or buy certain things in order to do or buy other things) and being ‘broke’ (not being able to do or buy anything). If I lived a mainstream life, no one would expect me to pull out my balance sheet, they would understand how someone my age living in her own home and driving a recent model car might need to be frugal in other areas of her life, and they’d understand that not being able to do it ‘all’ is normal!

So far, the financials of my RVing life have been very cyclical. I have had periods with good cashflow and periods with bad cashflow. During the good periods I get caught up and during bad periods I try not to get behind. The goal is, of course, to balance out these periods and provide a steadier cashflow instead of one with gigantic negative and positive peaks. This summer was my first taste of this ideal cashflow vision and it has been lovely, but I am now heading back into squirrel mode, especially since I have a couple of big expenses coming up.

One thing to keep in mind is that I’m single with only cats as my dependents. That gives me a lot of freedom in how I choose to allocate my money. Once the bills are paid and I’ve put money away for retirement and emergencies, there is no one to care if I decide to buy a new toy and eat beans for a month. But if I were to put all of this on a balance sheet for the world to say, I’d have to erase a lot of comments from people with different priorities and values who think they have a right to tell me how I should be managing things. I might as well save them the trouble. 😀

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Two Years on the Road

So often times it happens that we live our lives in chains
And we never even know we have the key. (the Eagles)

Two years on the road…

I think that if anyone knew the full story of some of the things that have happened over the past twenty-four months, they would be shocked that I have made it this far. I have survived bad employers, negative cash flow, a life threatening incident, and crushing loneliness. Why do I continue to persevere at making this life work when it is obviously so difficult?

Because it gets better every day. Because it lets me see wonderful places and meet amazing people. Because it does not leave time for boredom. Because it constantly challenges me. Because it has so much to teach. Because it gives me something to share. Because it is my calling; this is without a doubt what I am supposed to be doing with my one wild and precious life.

I thought that my second year on the road would be much more sedate than the first, but this was most certainly not the case! It started with a literal bang (of brake components failing) that taught me to slow down and be more present, paused on an island where I did my interior, took me back to the Klondike and past the Arctic Circle, before circling back to the beginning. I finally got my internet independence, made some serious progress in self-employment (the biggest of which still can’t be revealed!), and became a seasoned RVer.

My goals for year three are both general (to continue this upward trend) and specific (to add at least two more states to my list). Otherwise, I’m happy to see where the road will lead me now that I have checked so many of my expectations.

Thank you, once again, to all my wonderful readers, from those who have been with me from the start to those I picked up along the way.

Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake.

and

You cannot dream yourself into a character: you must hammer and forge yourself into one.

(Henry David Thoreau)

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Detachment

I’m leaving Dawson in less than two weeks. I’ve had an okay summer this year, but I still love this town and am glad that I have had a chance to know it so well. That said, my feelings about my imminent departure are completely different from last year. In fact, this is the first time I’m going to leave a place without having my departure panic attack. I didn’t really get settled in this year and I’ve stopped thinking of this stop as a destination, as an event with a beginning and an end. It seems that sometime between leaving Campbell River and the last couple of weeks, my RVing life began to find a continuity of its own, with routines that carry over whether I’m stopped or traveling.

Financially, the summer was a blessing and going back to financial incertitude is going to be tough, but I actually managed to do a solid job of replenishing the coffers. I’ll do fine for myself well into the fall even if I don’t find a job in Osoyoos, although I have decided to look for something part-time. I have enough set aside to actually travel back south and I’m giving myself a full sixteen days to do so. My itinerary is a bit bold and I may chicken out about one section, but I look forward to an even longer period of boondocking while being able to work every night.

My fall plans are slowly coming together. I have decided to fly to Montreal at the beginning of November for a week to see my family, something that will be made possible since I’ll have a rig and cat sitter available to me. My sister had a baby on September 1st, my first niece, so it will be nice to see her and my two nephews. I’m pretty sure the youngest one doesn’t remember me!

Besides that, I have a writing project to complete and I also need to work on things related to that announcement I’m not yet ready to make. I’d also like to continue with the renovating and decorating, although I will have to be extremely frugal in all areas of my life so as to stretch my savings as far as possible. I’m committed to being in Osoyoos until December and have not made plans beyond that.

So, that’s the latest status update. Nothing too exciting, but things are going to pick up soon. 🙂

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Driving the Dempster: Epilogue

There is something bittersweet about fulfilling a lifelong dream. There is the elation at having done it, but also a certain emptiness as you wait for another dream to take its place. There are a lot of things I’d like to do in the next ten years or so—tour Egypt, climb Mount Kilimanjaro, paddle down the Amazon, hike the Great Wall of China, visit friends in Australia—but nothing pressing. I may just be ready to settle for a little less excitement for a while, long enough to build a solid foundation to my traveling life.

My trip to the Arctic and NWT was only a superficial experience, I know that. I didn’t get to have any great wilderness adventures or actually try living in a remote community, but what I did was enough. I saw what I wanted to see and got the answers I came for. I had given up on this dream, watching it fade away as opportunities marched away from me, so standing there, knee deep in the Beaufort Sea was profoundly satisfying. It reaffirmed to me what I learned last year on the Chilkoot, that all you need to fulfill a dream is the courage and conviction to see it through.

My second year of full-timing, that of my Arctic adventure, is ending most satisfactorily and I am curious to see what year three will bring…

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Vacation Countdown

It seems that, once again, the weather has turned favourably just days shy of my embarking on another bucket-list journey. Unless something unpredictable happens, I will be en route to Inuvik on Monday, right on schedule.

Driving the Dempster, visiting Inuvik, and taking a charter plane to Tuktoyaktuk to dip my toe in the Arctic Ocean is my last major North America bucket list item. Oh, there’s so much more I’d like to do and see, but nothing so pressing.

I went to the Dempster information centre today to get updated road information and literature, then I schlepped over to the General Store for some food items and the Trading Post for a small propane cylinder. I will be camping and making most of my meals to keep costs low.

It is difficult to put into words what this journey means to me. I tried for so long, the better part of a decade, in fact, to find a job north of the Arctic Circle or some other circumstance that would bring me there. And now I’m going, under my own steam, having found my own northwest passage. Life just doesn’t get any better than this.