The Hellish Handbasket Blog

  • You can sing for it

    One of the perks of being a nomad is if your neighbors are noisy, you can almost always drive away. Now that I’m housed, I’m more of a homebody. Although there are so many advantages to being housed, if you live in an apartment, one of the major downsides is that you could have noisy neighbors.

    If you have lived in an apartment, you have probably experienced neighbors walking heavily. Maybe you’ve heard their music coming through the wall. Either one can be super annoying, expecially if you have a condition known as misophonia, which I do.

    I have neighbors on both sides. The neighbors in No. 6 are quiet. I hear an occasional bump on the wall, but that’s it.

    The couple in No. 5, specifically the husband, is a different story. The husband’s name is Allen. Allen and his wife are quiet most of the time. However, between the hours of 3 pm and 6 pm, Allen likes to sing.

    I can’t actually hear his voice unless I put my ear to the wall. What I hear, quite clearly, actually more like what I feel, is the pounding bass. The bass comes through the wall and goes straight into my bones.

    I’ve had trouble with boom bass situations in other places, not just apartments. Cars, for instance. I cringe when a vehicle goes by playing music with a booming bass. I can rarely hear the upper registers. Most of the time, I can’t even hear a melody. But I feel the bass in my gut, interfering with my breathing and elevating my heart rate.

    I think Allen might have a karaoke machine. Either that or he has a good stereo system. Something that puts out a strong bass beat. Whatever it is, to me, it’s like fingernails on a blackboard.

    To cope with Allen’s music, I have several options. First, I can leave. For example, I can go for a walk, drive to the store, or just sit in my car if it’s raining or cold. If I don’t want to leave, I can go into the bathroom (although I can’t do much in there because I don’t have a tub). I don’t do earplugs, but If I’m at my computer, I can put in earphones and turn up the sound. If I’m indoors in my workspace, I can still feel the pounding, but it’s ignorable. All these are viable options.

    Or I can put my ear to the wall and hear how much Allen loves to sing.

    Allen and his wife are from the Philippines. English is not Allen’s first language, but that is not the issue. Allen is not a great singer (in my opinion). That doesn’t stop him from belting out the tunes. He butchers Frank Sinatra. Neil Sedaka. Barry Manilow. All the classic crooners, he wrecks them all. That’s his jam. He practices almost everyday for an hour or two just before dinner.

    Even though sometimes I want to tear out what’s left of my hair, I can tolerate and even appreciate a person who loves creative self-expression as much as I do.

  • Attitude of gratitude

    I took housing for granted. I didn’t know it at the time, but now that I’m housed, I realize being unhoused is not normal. Shelter is a human need. Even animals need shelter. They dig holes, they build nests, they hang out under rocks. I supposed there are some that live under the open sky, but humans can’t for long. I’ve seen them try, and it doesn’t end well.

    I was lucky, so lucky, I had a car. Many unhoused people are not that lucky. I am grateful for that car, and I’m even more grateful that now it’s just a big hunk of metal on four rubber tires, sitting in the rain in the parking lot. It’s hard to believe I lived my life in that box for a year and a half. It’s hard to believe I don’t have to anymore.

    Now I am slogging through dissociation, trying to assimilate my new living situation. It feels surreal to walk across an entire room, to have two hallways to mix up (which one goes the bathroom, which one to the front door?), to have a bed way over there, ten generous steps from where I sit now typing. It’s been almost two months, and I still can’t believe this is where I live. That this space is for me.

    Eventually my brain will settle in, and the time I spent living in my car will fade into memory. Already, I’m marveling that I had the courage (and naivete) to drive across the country, sleeping overnight in rest areas and parking lots. It’s almost as if someone else was brave (and stupid), not me.

    This self-questioning has happened to me before. I’ve done things in my lfe I can’t believe I did . . . produced fashion shows, ran a marathon, taught at a college, earned a doctorate, published books . . . Now I can add my epic cross-country road trip to the list. I’m grateful to the Universe I was able to make that trip, because I don’t think I’ll ever be able to do something like that again.

    Speaking of which, did I mention I tore out the build in my car? My little house on wheels is no longer habitable. It’s just empty space now, with a steering wheel at the front. If it disappeared from the parking lot, I would be sad, but I would be okay. Everything I need is within walking distance. Food, doctor, library. What more does one need?

    My friends tell me I sound a lot more relaxed now. I am. I can feel it. The tension in my body has dissipated a lot, in spite of arthritis eating at my hip, in spite of my continued dizziness. I have a lot fewer things to worry about. On the road, I was constantly planning and doing, white-knuckling in the moment. Now I meander from one activity to another, with long stretches of time during which I stare out the window at green grass, trees, and clouds, doing nothing. The only thing I lack is a bathtub. If I had a tub, I’d be in it right now.

    I still have plans, but now my plans don’t involve devising survival strategies. I’m noodling around with my next writing project, trying to find a way into a new world. I’m spending a lot of time (for very little compensation) being a helpful committee member to wannabe dissertators. I go for walks when it’s not too cold. I eat more vegetables. I keep blogging.

    On the downside, I spend way too much time watching independent news channels, but on the upside, I also spend a lot of time enjoying Korean romcoms. It’s a nice balance of terror and comedy, a small personalized reflection of reality.

  • Traumatized brain stuck in a rut

    Life goes on against the backdrop of general insanity. We don’t stop breathing until it’s over. Meanwhile, we navigate the speedbumps and keep going. Despite all the madness, I still count myself lucky to have been born in this place and time. Having the correct color of skin helps too. Despite my guilt, it’s not something I take for granted. There but for a random twist of DNA in a random universe go I.

    Anyway, all that to say, I continue to persist as best I can, aware that my safe White old person bubble could burst at any moment along with my front door. (Odds are low that ICE will come knocking, but so are the odds of a plane crash. It happens. As a news addict, I can’t ignore the videos of violence happening in Portland and Eugene.)

    Meanwhile. I’m still processing the shock of my new existence as a housed person. Did I mention I almost had a panic attack? The strange reality of being housed is apparently so unsettling, my brain had to exit my body for a moment by way of mild hyperventilation. It was brief, and I was aware it was happening, so I was able to talk myself into breathing normally. I’m okay, but little vestiges of panic come up at least once a day, especially when I look at my toilet. For some reason, toilets are a symbol of safety, not sure why that is.

    I sometimes shop for household stuff at Walmart, one of the least bad big box options. I feel guilty and demoralized at the idea that I’m abetting a mega-corporation that abuses its employees. However, I’m boycotting Amazon. And Home Depot. And now I’ve added Lowes to the list. Instead, I support WinCo and BiMart, both employee-owned, and I shop at Fred Meyer, a Kroger brand, because, well, Fred Meyer started in Portland, and I spent most of my pre-adult life in the Gateway store.

    When I shop anywhere, my eye zeroes in on items I no longer need. I’m talking about butane canisters, bungie cords, and giant tote bins. Camping chairs, cheap tents, tie-downs, tarps. Shower tents, USB-powered water pump faucets, collapsible dishes, rolls of Reflectix, USB-powered lights and fans.

    When I’m driving, I still note places to dump trash, refill my water jugs, park overnight, park during the day. If the sun is shining, I think, yay, time to recharge my power stations. If it’s raining, I think, bummer, now I have to recharge somewhere like Starbucks or the local library. If it’s cold, I think, how am I going to stay warm? If it’s hot, I think, how am I going to sleep when it’s 95° in my car?

    Now I don’t have to do all those things. Gradually they are fading out of my brain, and I find I have a lot more time to do other things. For example, in addition to worrying about the state of democracy, I’ve started nibbling around the corners of my next book project.

  • Welcome back to the land of S.A.D.

    Now that I’m housed, instead of doing van chores, I do apartment chores in my nice warm dry apartment. Doing van chores in the rain sucks. Getting wet while fetching tools from the trunk gets old, especially when you have only one jacket and a limited number of dry pants and socks. Doing apartment chores is easier in the sense that you don’t get wet while you do them (unless you are scraping turkey poop off the back patio). However, indoor chores, for me anyway, are hard because I keep stopping to stare morosely out the sliding door to see if the rain has stopped.

    Rain west of the Oregon Cascades is named based on intensity: Mist, sprinkles, drizzle, showers, downpours. I’m sure there are more labels. A day of rain has often been referred to as a slogfest by one of my favorite former Portland meteorologists.

    I’ve set up my computer desk, AKA camping table, facing the patio door so I can monitor the current rain status. If the clouds appear to be thinning or lifting, if I can see a hint of blue sky or see a patch of sun on the grass, I quickly throw on my rain jacket and put on my walking shoes. If I’m lucky I can get a half hour of dry walking before the rain returns and I get drenched.

    I have seasonal affective disorder, AKA S.A.D. I’m pretty sure I’ve had it all my life. I dread fall because it inevitably leads to winter, my least favorite season. When I was an adolescent, if the sun was shining, no matter the temperature, I would lean against the thick trunk of a fir tree staring at the sun through my eyelashes. Not a good idea, I know, but I was driven by desperation.

    S.A.D. for me manifests as brain fog. You could call it mild depression. If I get enough daylight, the brain fog lifts. During the winter, it takes hours of being out in daylight. Sunshine is the cure. I used to have a lightbox. Maybe it was my imagination, but sitting in front of it close enough to smell the negative ions pouring from the vent seemed to help.

    As I got older, my S.A.D. symptoms shifted to spring. April and May became months of melancholy. At one point, I made the mistake of telling a doctor about my brain fog. The doctor sent me to a psychotherapist, who prescribed Prozac. The antidepressant depressed a lot of things but did nothing for the brain fog. In June, I felt much better. The improvement in symptoms confirmed my S.A.D. self-diagnosis. Now I consult Dr. Google, who in my opinion is a lot smarter than that psychotherapist.

    Household chores right now involve unpacking and organizing. I like being reunited with all my possesions, meager as they are. I don’t have any furniture yet, so I can’t access some of my stuff, books, for instance. But it’s satisfying to see them in the clear tote bin that is serving as my credenza. It’s fun to get organized. I now have three analog clocks ticking on three different walls. No matter where I am in this tiny apartment, I always know what time it is. Well. Does anyone really know what time it is? But let’s not get all philosophical. I’m just talking about cheap Target wall clocks.

    In addition to getting organized, it’s fun to fix things. For example, after I perused a helpful DIY YouTube video, the stove burners are now level. I’ve scraped a little paint off the floor. I applied a few drops of “tranquility” aroma therapy oil, which I’ve carted around for 30 years for some unknown reason, along the baseboards by my bed where I saw a few ant scouts. The ants find it distasteful. I’m not sure I like it either. Just a few minutes ago, I squirted extra strength spray glue to readhere a couple fake wood vinyl floor planks that were lifting up in front of the patio door. I’m not sure if it worked, but it’s always fun to spray glue.

    If you’ve read this far, and I’d be surprised if you have, you’ve probably figured out that I have basically nothing to blog about. Nobody bugged me over the holidays. Walmart was calm, even a few days before Christmas. The cashier wasn’t snotty. The weather has been typically wet and chilly but not snowy or freezing. The shower water is hot, the toilet flushes (toilets are amazing), the fridge works . . . really, I can’t find anything to complain about. Didn’t I post last week that I’m still a chronic malcontent? Maybe I was wrong. Other than this stupid cold season, I don’t have much to moan about.

    You are probably saying, but Carol, if that is the case, what’s the point of having a blog? To that I would say, go spend your time doing something with actual value, like, I don’t know, watching a Heather Cox Richardson video or getting sucked into a Korean romcom. Just about anything you can think of would be more enlightening than reading this blog. But don’t expect me to stop posting. For me, this blog is better than any psychotherapist.

  • The shock of stopping

    The reality of my new housing situation is starting to sink in. This week I closed out my storage unit in Portland. Yesterday I finished unloading the dregs from my car, leaving just the bare bed platform and empty shelves as testaments to my former life as a nomad. Eventually I will vacuum the dust, bugs, and fingernail clippings from the filthy rug and pretend like that time in my life happened to someone else.

    Since I left Portland in 2021, I have worked hard to streamline my life. Time and again, I gritted my pearlies and embraced successive waves of death cleaning. I donated my appliances to my roommate. I replaced my furniture with camping chairs. I traded in my shelves for plastic tote bins, solar panels, and portable power stations.

    I spent a lot of money turning my car into a liveable space. When I say “liveable,” I mean a space that could provide me the basics: kitchen, bathroom, living room, bedroom, all packed into one soccer-mom minivan.

    I’ve always been able to cram my life into small spaces so turning my car into a home wasn’t all that difficult. It took me a while to figure out what I wanted and needed, and that uncertainty cost me a lot of money and time; however, after a year and a half, I’d worked out most of the kinks in the nomadic lifestyle. If housing hadn’t appeared, my next task would have been to add solar on the roof.

    Loading and unloading in Veneta was hard. Books! Sewing machine! I berate myself for keeping so much stuff. After all these years of downsizing! Possessions are a plague upon the land. Days later, my muscles are still protesting. On the other hand, my reward for unloading in the rain was a rainbow.

    Now I see what I have. Besides my camping gear, I have lots of blankets, a few clothes, some household goods, and the ashes of my two dead cats. It’s not a lot but I still feel overwhelmed with stuff.

    Now that I’m housed, the possession plague has deposited spores in my brain. I need a bed. I need a table and a chair, maybe a shelf. I definitely need some lamps. I dread getting more stuff, not just because this is the worst possible time of year for shopping but also because if this housing adventure becomes unaffordable, I will once again have to downsize. It’s heart wrenching to fall in love with a chair and then come to hate it when nobody will take it off your hands.

    How do I all of a sudden stop living one life and start living another? Who am I if I’m no longer the freedom-loving nomad? No longer the stealthy arthritic vehicle dwelling senior? No longer the resourceful intrepid roadtripper? Did I just stop being those people and become someone else?

    Ha. As usual, I still haven’t figured out who I am. This existential question seems to be a recurring theme in my blogposts. It’s ridiculous how a self-centered theme could provide me with fourteen years of musings, rants, diatribes, and complaints but that is what has happened. As long as I can keep writing, I don’t expect anything to change. Whatever I am now, I’m still a card-carrying chronic malcontent.

  • Joining the ranks of the housed population

    I am now in my new apartment in Veneta, Oregon. Up until a year and a half ago, I did not know Veneta existed. I applied to waitlists at several affordable senior housing facilities around the Willamette Valley. All I wanted was something affordable not in Portland. Veneta came up first.

    Veneta is a small town. I have not yet discovered with my own feet how small it is. I just got here yesterday. However, judging by Google Maps, this place is miniscule compared to other places I’ve lived, namely Portland, Los Angeles, Tucson, and Scottsdale. I hope I like small town living. More to be revealed on that issue.

    I pulled the mattress out of my car. I guess you could call it a mattress. It’s a 2-inch thick slab of foam rubber, 72 inches long and 24 inches wide. That is not much of a bed for the back of a minivan, but its true inadequacies are apparent when the mattress is on a cold hard floor. Warm air rises, cold air sinks. The heater works, and it’s got a flap to point the warm air downward, but I’m guessing I’d be a lot warmer if I got bunkbeds and slept on the top bunk.

    The kitchen style is tiny galley. The stove is missing two burner rings, but the two remaining burners work. One has something toxic on it, and the stove fan does not work, so that leaves one small burner. (Really, how many burners does a person need?) The other major component of the kitchen, the fridge, is doing a yeoman’s job of chilling a box of soymilk and one remaining apple. Are fridges supposed to sound like a babbling brook when they are running? It’s kind of like having an intermittent indoor water feature, without the water.

    The toilet hasn’t clogged so far, so that’s good news. However, I’m sad to report, the apartment is not equipped with a bathtub. I wasn’t surprised to see a huge fiberglas shower, complete with handrails. This is senior housing, after all. You get what you get when you are old and poor. I’m surprised there aren’t grab bars around the toilet. The shower turns on, and the water gets hot (I have my own water heater!), but I don’t have a shower curtain, so I’m sponging in the sink.

    No bugs to speak of, just a couple spiders and the desiccated carcass of a miniscule slug. Don’t ask me how the thing got in here, I don’t want to know.

    I have a back patio. It’s not huge, but it’s big enough for a patio chair. I will get morning sun next May if I’m lucky. The AC/heating unit releases its condensation across the concrete to the grass. I expect the pavement to be etched soon, if it isn’t already. On the bright side, if the water ices over, the critters in the backyard can use it as skating rink. There are critters. I know this because there are several piles of critter poop on the patio and one pile on top of the AC/heating unit. It’s not cat, dog, or coyote poop. Could it be raccoon poop? The piles remind me of duck or geese poop. I can’t imagine my patio was visited by a duck or a goose, but who knows? Something pooped back there, and it wasn’t me. I’ve only been here a day, though. Give me time.

    I’m relieved I didn’t put my camping table in storage. My office area consists of a camping table, a $9.99 Walmart camping chair, and essential office supplies scattered on the floor around me. Besides my floor mattress, these two items are my only furniture. I have another camping chair in storage, and it’s a nice one, let me tell you. However, camping chairs suck as office chairs. I will be making some trips to thrift stores in Eugene next week.

    Moving is hard. You know this, we’ve all moved at least once in our lives. It’s stressful to pack and schlep, even if you have very few possessions. I have PTSD from the move from Portland to Tucson. Downsizing, giving away so much, and still moving so much crap I thought I could not live without. Then the ultimate downsizing challenge, moving into my car. And I still have too much stuff, hence, the storage unit. I am loathe to start accumulating stuff again. Furniture, kitchen appliances and supplies, clothes, dishes, books . . . my heart rate speeds up just thinking about it. I dread the next downsize.

    Some of you will sleep better knowing I am now housed in a place with heat and running water. I’m not, but I am glad you are.

  • I’m already missing the sun

    My three-week attempt to pretend as if I belong here in paradise, AKA Scottsdale, Arizona, is coming to a close. In a few days, I’ll be making the trek back to Oregon. In other words, voluntarily turning myself in to begin my sentence in the gray cold rain prison known as the Willamette Valley. I’m spending a lot of time staring into blue sky, hoping I won’t forget what it looks and feels like when I’m trudging through sleet to get into the grocery store without slipping.

    Other than the weather, I don’t know what my new life as a housed person is going to look like. I have the keys to my new apartment, but I haven’t seen it yet. Nor have I spent time in my new town, other than one drive-by. I have a feeling my bleeding liberal heart will not be welcomed by most of the town folk. I just hope when they see my “No Kings” window stickers, they don’t choose me for the Lottery.

    Maybe I’ll like it there in my new town. Maybe I’ll decide I love the cold gray drizzly skies after all, that sunshine and blue skies are for babies and wimps. I met people in Portland who said they loved the gray drizzle. I looked at them as if they were curious misguided members of an exotic species. They were never from the Willamette Valley. That should tell you something.

    Maybe I’ll spend a month in the tub, assuming my new place has hot water. I have no idea if it has a tub. That wasn’t on my dealbreaker list. The only dealbreakers I stipulated were no cockroaches and no bedbugs. The property manager assured me the apartment complex had neither. I believe her about cockroaches. Like me, they don’t tend to favor cold climates. Bedbugs, on the other hand, will live anywhere there is a live human host. I guess an animal will do if starvation is imminent, but humans are the staple of the bedbut diet, not to mention the scourge of multifamily housing.

    Speaking of getting bitten, mosquitoes. Not surprising they like it here. Sprinklers plus shady grass equals delicious mud puddles that never evaporate. Plus there are two or three good sized ponds, small lakes, you could call them, full of turgid brown water. A few fountains and aerators do a haphazard job of mud mixing, but I’m sure if I were a mosquito looking for a nice place to dump my eggs, this is heaven. Divots of standing water abound.

    I won’t have to miss the mud. I’m sure there will be plenty where I’m going. But I will miss the intense blue sky and the sun glittering on the lakes. I’ll miss the little dog, who constantly makes me laugh, even when she’s being an annoying manipulative pill. I’ll miss the leafy trees and colorful flowers. I’ll miss the huge marble-surfaced kitchen island, twice as bigger in square footage as my minivan. I’ll miss the stainless steel fridge that generously dispenses not just water but also ice cubes and crushed ice. I’ll miss the skylights that glow at night with light from the full moon.

    I’m sadder by the minute when I think of leaving Arizona. It’s likely I won’t be back.

  • Look back but don’t stare

    This week I have access to electricity. If you have ever lived long without it, you know how great it is. I’m lucky enough to have been born in the U.S., where most of the time, most of us have access to electricity, if we choose to connect. I know in many places around the world, electricity is not available or nonexistent.

    When I’m on the road, I keep track of the power levels on my three power boxes. They are all baby power boxes, compared to some of the monsters van lifers talk about on their van life YouTube channels. When I say monster, I mean, back-breaking space hogs that can power a microwave, a fridge, a laptop, and a television—all at the same time!

    I can power my portable camping fridge for three days and two nights with my 800 wh power box. My little 240 wh box will run my laptop for a solid 6 hours. Any appliance that generates serious heat, like a heater, for instance, will chew through power like this dog I’m babysitting chews through her breakfast, that is to say, the box won’t last long. This is why van lifers who heat their vans use propane, butane, or diesel.

    I’ve forgotten why I started writing this blogpost.

    Oh, yeah. Electricity.

    Having unlimited access to electricity for a couple weeks has meant I can get some tasks done that I can’t easily do on the road. For example, I can do a massive file backup to the solid state drive I cannibalized from my old desktop computer before I donated it to the e-recyling nonprofit in Tucson. That might make my laptop happy. On the downside, I’ll never be able to find anything. Which is kind of the theme of living in one’s car.

    I can cull the songs on the flashdrive I plug into the USB port in my car. I’ve decided I no longer care for Zydeco. There are a few Doors songs that came with an album I ripped some years back that I’d rather not listen to again. I’m really sick of hearing Pleasant Valley Sunday. The shuffle option on the USB drive is stuck in some stupid algorithm that serves up songs in the same order. Thankfully, I figured out I can press the >>> button on the radio to skip to the next track. But it will be better if the offending songs are removed altogether.

    For the past couple days, I’ve been archiving the blogposts from the Hellish Handbasket blog, which has been hosted on Blogger since 2012. As I was going through the files, I tried not to read any of the text, but was hard not to notice references to my mother, because there are so many. And to my cat, whose demise still breaks my heart. I carry the ashes of my two dead cats in my car. Leaving them in storage for so long was weighing on me. I figure if I drive the car off a bridge, at least we’ll all go down together.

    Let’s see, what else? I can finish editing and formatting the third book of the trilogy I’ve been working on for two years. In my defense, the book has been delayed because my characters’ ideas were different from mine. When your characters jump off the page, it’s hard to get them back within the margins. It took me a while to figure out who they were and what they wanted to say. I’ve always loved to write, even if no one ever reads my work. I write for myself. Which is a good thing, because I don’t see my own typos anymore.

    Scottsdale weather this week has been like Willamette Valley weather but 20 degrees warmer. It’s been cloudy and wet here. The dog and I are both sunloving creatures, so we’ve had to compete for whatever patch of sun we can find. She always wins. I’ve learned to tolerate rain showers, but I’m lucky. I have an umbrella and a great rain jacket. The dog has neither. She doesn’t mind getting her paws wet or dirty, but she despises rain on her back. She would hate living in Oregon.

    Once again, I realize why I left Oregon for Arizona, and before that, for California. I was born in Oregon, but I never felt I belonged there. Soon I will be returning to Oregon to live. I’m relieved that I’ll have stable housing for the next year, but I’m anxious about the gray skies and frequent showers. Winter is not my favorite time of year, and returning to Oregon in December doesn’t sound like fun. Still, I have to go. I’m paying rent for a place I haven’t even seen yet. I suppose I should at least find out if it has cockroaches.

    And electricity.

  • Still chronically malcontented after all these years

    I’m never satisfied. It doesn’t matter where I am or what I’m doing, I admit, I’m rarely content. I’m not always conscious that I’m not content. Lately I’m just taking life as it comes, but sometimes I wake up and realize things in the world, and in my life, could be better.

    I can’t do anything about the world’s problems, and my only choices to improve my own life are (a) change my attitude or (b) change my situation. I’m ruled by fear, I know. I fall repeately into the wreckage of the future.

    Speaking of future wrecking, this week, I signed a lease on a studio apartment in a low-income senior housing . . . what do you call it? A facility? A complex? It’s not a nursing home, I don’t think. It’s not big enough to be called a complex, whatever that is.

    I’ve seen the apartments from the outside, but I haven’t actually seen the apartment I’m renting. That’s nuts, right? At this point, I don’t care. As long as it has hot water, heat, and no cockroaches, I’m good. Mainly, I’m looking forward to making my family happy.

    So what did I do? I paid my rent, deposit, and the electricity deposit, and immediately left town.

    Actually I had a preplanned gig to babysit the little dog Maddie. I left Portland on Wednesday, stopped in Coos Bay to sign the lease and hand over a large amount of money, and then I hit the road, heading south toward the desert.

    Did you know that California hates travelers? I’d forgotten. California has arranged the rest areas along I-5 to be (a) stuck in endless renovation, (b) limited to an eight-hour stay, or (c) barred to overnight parking. I experienced this lack of courtesy on the drive north, which is why I ended up driving from the Cracker Barrel in Bakersfield all the way to the Welcome Center in Ashland, Oregon.

    This time, I made the trip in reverse. From Medford, I drove south on I-5, assuming I would come to a rest area that would put me up for the night. Closed, time limit, no overnight parking, yada yada. So I kept going south, heading toward the only place I knew I could park without a hassle. Yep. Cracker Barrel in Bakersfield.

    On the bright side, literally: the Beaver Moon. On the downside, I can’t see well at night. Plus, I wasn’t familiar with the road from I-5 to Bakersfield. Lots of irate drivers stacked up behind me. I’m always the pilot car. I put a handmade sticker on my back window: Go around me. It’s probably only readable when the semi behind me is about to crawl up my tail pipe.

    Remind me never to eat at Cracker Barrel again. What was I thinking? In my defense, I know I ate there once before, and I forgot that I had vowed not to repeat the horrors. Second worst coffee ever. I forget where I had the worst coffee. I won’t remember until I go there again.

    So now I’m sitting in my car, which is parked in the desert outside of Quartzsite, where everyone around me is doing the same thing, a hundred yards away in all directions, spread out like galaxies in the expanding universe. The breeze is light, the sun is shining, the sky is brilliant blue, and the temperature is heading up, up, up. Perfect. I’d stay here forever if it weren’t so dang hot in the summer. And if I had proper housing with air conditioning.

    But my life is about to change. Soon I will be housed, at least for the next year. My savings will drain away slowly, as they have since I left Portland in 2021. This trajectory can only go one way, unless I win the lottery, which is unlikely.

    I’m going to take contrary action and refuse to succumb to my chronically malcontented self. Out here, with the dome of blue sky overhead, I almost feel content. Soon I will be loading my stuff out of the storage unit and into my car to make the two-hour drive to my new town. I hope the apartment will not be too dark or depressing. I hope the people are nice, and more important, quiet. I hope I can find some cheap used furniture (the kind that doesn’t come with bedbugs). Mainly, I hope I have enough savings to last the year.

    If it all goes sideways . . . and if I my car still works, and if I can still drive, I can always come back to the desert.

  • What lies beyond the refuge of resentment?

    I’ve been walking a lot lately. Today I walked at a favorite location: the Sandy River Delta. It costs money to park in the parking lot, so I park at the Lewis & Clark State Recreation Area (which FYI as of October 1 also requires a $10 per day parking permit, but you can get an annual permit for only $30).

    The path to the Delta goes under a railroad bridge and then under the east bound and westbound lanes of the I-84 freeway.

    Today I passed two big dumpsters just before I got to the underpasses, both filled to the rims with plastic bags and trash. I thought, uh-oh.

    Many homeless people live in encampments along the Sandy River, just past the freeway. At least, until now.

    Today I walked under the underpass and found two uniformed guards standing in front of a white canopy tent. A portapotty on a little trailer was parked next to the tent. One of the guards was young and pale, with a toothy smile. The other was older and shorter with brown skin (not Hispanic, more like Middle Eastern). Both perked up when they saw me coming toward them.

    I emerged into the sunlight, put on my I-come-in-peace face, and said hello, how are you doing? Then I asked, what are you doing?

    “Making sure no one goes that way,” the young guy said, pointing toward the River where the encampments were.

    “Oh, that’s what those dumpsters . . . ?”

    He nodded.

    I pointed in the opposite direction, toward the Delta parking lot. “I always go that way.”

    I almost told them I got lost in the woods one time and passed many little huts, tents, and tarp shelters pitched among the trees and along the riverbank. Why bother, though? I just wanted to tell someone I got lost. It’s not exactly news. I get lost pretty much everywhere I go. For sure, I didn’t want to ask my burning question: Where the hell do you think these people are going to go?

    “Have a nice day,” said the kid.

    Speaking of unhoused, I’m still waiting to hear if the property management company is going to rent to me. I’m living in limbo these days, roaming the I-5 freeway, bopping from one rest area to another, trying to avoid Portland as much as possible. I wouldn’t call this the nomadic life the YouTubers gush about. This lifestyle reminds me of a short sci-fi story I read once, where parking was so scarce, people spent their lives in their cars. Obviously, that was before drive-thru was de rigeur.

    The weather is shifting toward winter here in the Pacific Northwest. Nights are getting cold. Sunbreaks are rare, which means I’m having to charge my big power station at a library or coffee shop. Compared to living in the Arizona, maintaining electricity while homeless is a lot of work.

    Not to mention, Portland is apparently on fire. Somehow that happened, and I didn’t notice.

    I would head south right now but there’s a No Kings day planned for October 18. Gotta be there. Then I have medical stuff in early November. The minute that is done, I’m making tracks for Arizona.

    Unless I get housing. Then a new chapter begins.