forging friendships

i've decided that it's high time i made some friends in this town. it's spring, i'm tired of being a hermit and when i decide to see it, there are amazing wonders within every person i meet. so, i'm forging a friendship with my co-worker jessica. she's obnoxious, charasmatic, addictive, and totally great. i love talking to her an she's up for any adventure, a rare trait to be sure. we went out tonight after work and had the best time--a few drinks, a lot of convesation on the nature of relationships, and a little booty dancing at the end. she's a real person, no pretense, no bullshit, lets just go out, talk to some boys and call it good. we've started running together too, so now i have some accountability for my laziness.
good things are afoot....

three movies, one day

i borrowed three movies from the library deciding to take full advantage of my housesitting home theater. i watched them in this order--"Show Cats", a documentary on fancy purebred cats and the people who show them, "Secrets of the Wild Child", a documentary on the child named Genie who had been locked in a room for almost 13 years with only a potty chair and a crib, and "Hell House", a documentary on the Trinity church in Texas and the house they run every october to scare people into being christians by way of depicting hell. seeing these films and the wide variety of people and lives they illuminate made me feel good about being who i am where i am. i'm not a crazy cat lady yet, there are far more extreme cat lovers, i had a pretty awesome childhood with lots of love and education which has set me up to be the explorer that i am, and i'm not terrorized by extremist christian fear-mongering. i like seeing movies that reveal the extremes of society, i am always fascinated by the breadth of human experience. it allows me to feel more comfortable with my own eccentricities.

the way of the scavenger

i pride myself on being a good scavenger and i think it's an important skill to have if you, like me, want to get out of debt and/or live simply. if i can find it for free, and actually enjoy the process, then that saves me two times--once for the price of whatever it is i was going to buy, and twice by giving me something productive to do that doesn't cost any money.
one of my favorite methods is dumpster diving. in the city the easiest finds are furniture, building supplies, firewood, and clothing. it's harder to find good food because many places lock up their dumpsters or use compactors. i have to drive out of town a bit to get a good food dumpster. in smaller towns the easiest find is food. most little grocery stores don't think to lock up their dumpsters because they can't imagine someone would want their garbage, and you are therefore likely to be the only one that does. trader joe's is famous for having a prolific dumpster with all the food packaged neatly and easy to extract. whatever you are diving for, be courteous and leave the area cleaner then you found it. also, don't take more than you need, there may be others who will come after you.
another method is just keeping my eyes open for what i need as i go about my day. i often do this with food, i just wait until it's presesnted to me. in the restaurant biz, this is very easy, though it happens outside of work too. people in this country throw away tons of food and if you don't subscribe to germ paranoia, then eating off of a strangers plate makes perfect sense. discretion is required, at least for me, because i don't want to arouse discomfort in other's sense of order and i also don't want someone to offer to buy me food. i'm not starving or penniless, i just don't think food that i want to eat should go to the garbage instead. its a way of reducing the waste, people in other countries where food is more scarce view this as logical and normal--so do i.
another method that i love is thrifting. it's not free, but it's pretty cheap. goodwill is too expensive for the most part these days, i go to smaller independant thrift stores and there's a chain here called the arc that has 50% off sales all the time. here is where i buy the majority of my clothes, kitchen stuff, furniture, and sometimes books. now, there are times when i'll spend a chunk of cash on new shoes, or the occaisional $100 pair of jeans, but when money is an issue, it makes no sense to do that when comperable things are at the thrift store for under 5 bucks. and i should mention that i look great, all my clothes are unique and fit into my personal style. that's the beauty of thrifting, there's only one of everything in the store, perfect fun for the person who likes to dig for treasure.
as much fun as free stuff is, i've definately had to reign myself in as a van-dweller. it's easy to start aquiring too much stuff this way, after all it's free! this is where a sense of simplicity and streamlined economy are essential. i've found that this plus a love of scavenging produces a lifestyle of abundance. there are always more goodies to find, more food to eat, more adventures to have, so i don't need to hoard them.

unmotivated

i certainly haven't kept up with my exercise goals. i'm feeling really bad about it, and that's worse than i felt before i made the goal. ugh...i hate this stuck spot. to me, there's nothing worse than having nothing to blame but my own laziness. i abhor it.
i got the chateau back and it's ship-shape. it has a new fuel pump, an oil change, and the brakes were adjusted and are much grippier now. i'm still staying in a house which is fun, but i do miss rolling out of bed and into the outdoors. i feel cloistered away in this fancy lonely apartment looking out at the green leaves of this wet spring instead of touching them. hearing the birds sing muffled songs instead of crisp and close to my ear.
i still haven't figured out what i want to do for the winter. i'd like to at least make a visit to my family, and maybe live near one of the far flung aunts or uncles for a while. i just renewed my subscription to the caretaker's gazette, and i'm going to get the workamper guide as well, so maybe my winter answer will show up there.

reporting from my boss's house

i'm naked, sitting in my bosses bedroom, waiting for my grilled cheese to cook. freyja hates their cats so far, and has not held back her vocal protests, but i'm determined to make peace. we'll be here for four days, and i hope in that time to socialize her at bit. i'd love for her to get to the point where other animals are no big deal.
i've been hanging out with my friend jess from work lately, and i really like her. she's been through many of the same things i have--in love with a gay man and the eventual breakup, substance abuse, service industry burn-out, weight issues. it's a little easier to get by just knowing that someone else has been there too. she thinks the reason i'm alone is because people are afraid to get involved with someone who isn't rooted in place. i say, no one knows how long they'll be in one spot, i just accept that i'll be moving on sooner or later and figure i better find someone who is ok with that.
the chateau is still in the shop, i'll pick it up tomorrow. i think i'll try to get a few more housesitting gigs before i hit the road, it's great to have a house all to myself and be appreciated for loving on the cats and watering the tomatoes. and to have a bath!! i love to soak! it heals my wounds and puts my soul in order.

sleeping in the old van

tonight i'm sleeping in the old van because the chateau is in the shop getting a new fuel pump and an oil change. i put freyja in there and she was like "what the hell?!" i'm actually really grateful that i still have the van so i can do this. i want to sell it as soon as possible, but maybe it hasn't sold because i still need it. if i didn't have the old van still, my plan was to set up a tent in my parking spot while the repairs were getting done and ride my scooter to work. oh yeah, my scooter, i haven't blogged about that yet. i bought it a few months ago but have just recently been using it due to weather restrictions and laziness. it takes about 45 minutes to ride it to work from my spot because it only goes 25mph. it's a 1980 honda express in canary yellow, and i love it. it's like half the fun of a motorcycle at a sixteenth of the cost. no insurance, no registration, and it only cost 500 bucks. i'll try to post some pictures soon.
my boss is being really cool lately and asked me to housesit while he's out of town for a few days. he knows i live in the van, and he used to make fun of me, but now he has respect for it. i don't know what changed his mind, but i'm glad to be here now. in fact, that's my mantra--be here now, so simple, and it helps with the depression. i don't have to focus on the future or beat myself up about the past, just live the present moment in the best way i know how. i read a book called "the power of now" by eckhart tolle a few years ago and it's really brilliant. it addresses how to live in the now. simple but not easy. i should re-read it.
e won't return my phone calls, and i'm worried about him. maybe he'll read this and know that i miss him and want to be there for him. he shouldn't be alone at a time like this, it's not healthy. he's so stubbornly reclusive, he's too much like me!
in his absence, i've been up late drinking almost every night with my pals from work. not the greatest, i know, but it's something to do. the great thing about vandwelling is never risking a dui, just slip into bed and sleep!

gathering it all up

today i got all my stuff out of E's place. my friend jess helped me because i was scared that e wouldn't want to see me, but it wasn't like that at all. he told me what's been going on, and though i don't understand why he didn't tell me sooner, i feel relieved just to know. his way of coping with intense stress is to retreat into a very tight shell which leaves people who love him (i.e. me) out in the cold wondering what they did wrong. turns out, it's not about me in the least. i feel sad that he doesn't want to talk about it, but i don't know what to do to help him. i guess just continue to leave him alone. i called several times today to see if he wanted to hang out, but he was doing something with his kids for mother's day and all he could spare was a text to tell me he wasn't interested.
at any rate, i have all my stuff in one place now. sort of. i still have the old van, and some of the stuff is in there--a box that i'm sending to my mom's house, a box going to the thrift store, and random massage stuff. the rest i fit in my little shed at the parking spot. i've got to get it sorted and pared down so that i'll be ready to leave when i'm ready to leave. i can't decide if i should sell my massage chair, i hardly ever use it, but it could be very handy for a mobile massage business this winter.
i feel good about my progress toward a totally van contained life. there is absolutely no reason why i need more stuff than i can fit in my giant van. life is lived outside my "stuff" now.
i'm having a bad girl streak--i drank mimosa's at brunch, a beer for lunch and i just finished a half pint of ice cream for dinner. now i'm going to a bar to see if i want to hang out with this guy who's been calling me. i don't want to date him, but maybe he has a cute friend:) hehehe