My Personal Independence

Why do these things keep happening to me?

That’s not a complaint.  I’m not whining or asking for sympathy.  I know that I have been blessed.  I know that I have had a good life.  The question is of the straight-forward, searching-for-answers variety that would bring understanding to my chronically crazy life.  I am just looking for some perspective, some meaning for the series of strange events that have occurred in my life lately.  Does everything really happen for a reason?  If it does, than what has been the purpose of incidents happening in the last couple of years?

In particular…

I can’t seem to stop living out of my car!  For the past ten years, I have rented a variety of apartments throughout Southern California.  Yes, it is true…I have moved about seven times since I arrived in Palm Springs, California, in October of 2004.  I have moved so many times that one of my friends told me that she always dedicates a full page of her address book just to me because she knows she will have to make constant updates.  She made the comment, “You move more than someone on the lam.”  She’s right, I suppose.  I do move around a lot.  Is the change due to my constant restlessness and wanderlust?  Actually, no….

There is a deep part of me that dreams of settling down somewhere.  I dream of setting down roots, having a family, becoming a familiar face in the community.  But circumstances have continually caused me to move, not into a house but into the bucket seats of my 2010 Toyota Scion.

Before the Scion was home, my main residence was a 2002 Toyota Tacoma.  Every time I think of that pick-up truck, I get a horrible case of homesickness.  I have more feelings of “Home” for that truck than any place I’ve ever lived in California.  I have never stayed anywhere else long enough, I guess, to get attached to a particular structure.

I moved into my first California apartment in 2004.  I was there for eight months until the owners decided to sell the property.  I was told to either by the rundown, ‘70s decorated one-bedroom place or get out.  I got out…and moved into my truck.  My next apartment was a small studio where I stayed for almost two years until new management refused to repair leaky air conditioners, fix broken windows, and control the roach problem…and then doubled the rent! Back into the truck I moved.  I stayed in the truck until I rented my next apartment in Oceanside, California.  I had been offered a new position with higher pay.  Within six months, however, the Oceanside company folded.  Thankfully, my old job in Palm Springs took me back.  Unfortunately, I couldn’t commute four hours a day nor pay for two separate apartments, so I stayed in my truck until the lease on the Oceanside apartment had ended.

The next apartment I had in Palm Springs was my favorite.  I stayed there for almost two years until my mother moved to California and into the apartment with me.  Suddenly, the studio apartment seemed much smaller.  Mom and I didn’t move into my truck.  Instead, we moved into a two-bedroom apartment that featured a multitude of lizards running around the courtyard.  Little lizards were always waiting on the porch to greet us every time we opened the front door.  Mom and I lived in that apartment for eight months until I lost my mother to colon cancer in March 2010.  I couldn’t maintain a two-bedroom apartment by myself.  I didn’t move back into the pickup this time.  Instead, I was living in a 2010 Toyota Scion which had replaced the truck the year before.  Man, I miss that truck!

Later, I moved into a one bedroom apartment determined that I would make it a home…which I did for two and a half years until mice moved into the walls.  The owners of the building just laughed at me when I complained.  “You’re living in the desert,” they said.  “You’re going to have snakes, mice, lizards, and roaches in every apartment no matter how clean you keep it!”  Oh, the apartment was also haunted.  The manager couldn’t seem to explain away the spirits, which actually didn’t seem to bother me.  My friend, Olga, always laughs at this incident.  She says, “You stayed with the ghosts, but moved with the mice.”  Well, yeah, mice are scary!  Thank goodness, my car doesn’t have mice…or ghost.

My last California apartment was in Palm Desert where I lived for 18 months until more little critters chased me back into my Scion.  Maybe I should have stood my ground and not little the creatures push me around.  Maybe I should have demanded that the critters leave, especially since they weren’t paying rent.  Being nervous about confrontations though, I ended up being the one to move out.  I threw all of my things into storage and sadly moved back into my Toyota Scion, feeling like a complete failure.

My friend, Terry, helped me move the last of my possessions into the storage space on July 4^th, Independence Day.   I was really not happy about the situation when Terry placed the very last item into the bin and I shut and locked the door.  My whole life awkwardly fit into a tiny 5 X 5 space.

Suddenly, Terry looked at me and said excitedly, “Oh my gosh!  Happy Independence Day!  You’re free!” I turned to look at her in surprise.  “This is so great for you,” Terry continued to say.  “I wish I was like you.  Without the apartment and lots of possessions, you have no obligations.  You’re so free.  You don’t get held down by anything.  You just travel and go whenever you want.  What an amazing way to live!”

I stared at her for a moment.  It was an interesting perspective she just presented to me.  I could whine that I didn’t have a home or I could celebrate my freedom.  It suddenly dawned on me that every time I switched apartments, I actually did celebrate.  After I left the first apartment, I drove through Southwestern America.  When I left the second apartment, I drove cross country to the Northeast.  After the third, I think I ended up in Pacific Northwest.  I suddenly began to think about all the great places I’ve been when I was in between homes.  With freedom and my home life contained in my car, I usually just drove everywhere my wanderlust encouraged me.  Now, my sudden new liberty was filling my head with dreams of the very last American state I had to visit—Alaska!

“Yeah,” I smiled back at Terry then, “you’re right.  I do have a lot of freedom.”

“Independence!  Happy 4^th of July!” Terry cried as we hugged each other for a moment.  “I want to be not only free but brave like you!  I’m proud of you.”

And that’s maybe why I don’t have a home.  Maybe that’s why these things keep happening to me.  Maybe there is a reason, a purpose, a plan.  Maybe I am supposed to be on the road discovering God’s beautiful land.

I’m not totally free.  Alaska will have to wait a few more weeks because of my job.  But as I lie down every night in the back seat of my Toyota Scion to sleep, I continue to dream of Alaska and my incredibly bright, unknown, unpredictable future and I know I am home.

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Good Friends

A few weeks ago, I ran into an old friend I hadn’t seen in a while.  We didn’t have a falling out or any upsets.  Our lives had just started to move in different directions.  Due to families, jobs, tragedies, responsibilities, and blessings, we had just gotten involved in our own lives and lost touch for a while.  I believe our surprising reunion wasn’t a random incident.  We tend to weave our way in and out of each other’s life in perfect union with God and the universe.  We were destined to see each other again.  This moment had been divinely orchestrated.

I was on break from my job and decided to fill my car with gas before returning to the campus.  I had pulled up to one of the pumps in the Sam’s Club parking lot.  As I pumped gas into the tank, I was just mindlessly glancing around at the cars and people that surrounded me.  Suddenly, I noticed a small blue car sitting right on the other side of the pump I was using.  My attention was drawn to the white stencil that covered the back of the window.  The curvy lettering joyfully advertised the services of a puppeteer.  Smiling, little, white childish faces decorated the bottom of the window.  Oh, my gosh, I know someone who drives a car just like that! I turned slightly to the right…and there she was, my friend, Jane.  “Jane?” I called out to her.  Honestly, that was all I had said and suddenly I found myself wrapped in her embrace and we were talking again as if we had never been apart.

As our gas tanks continued to fill, Jane and I excitedly shared updates about our lives.  Jane was still doing her puppet shows and had gotten married again.  I was still teaching at the college and had published a book.  Both our lives had stayed the same and changed so much.  Jane asked me if I would like to come to dinner at her house one night.  I agreed and she informed me that she would contact me through Facebook soon.  Our tanks were filled and our hearts were open and we decided to go our separate ways before we held up the line of people waiting patiently in their cars behind us.

A few days later, Jane contacted me and we arranged a time to meet.  I happily went over to her house on a Friday night.  Even though some things had changed, there was a warm familiarity to Jane’s home. I love Jane’s house, which is filled with pictures and mementos from a life filled with love, obstacles, successes, and journeys.  I love homes like this.  I’m not a snoop.  I only go into rooms I am invited into and I only look at items that are out in the open, not hidden away in drawers or cabinets.  But I love to see the pictures and memories that create a life.  In any friend’s home, i usually will gaze at the family portraits on the walls.  I’m the guest who will joyful look at all of the photo albums and baby books over hot coffee or iced tea.  I respect and treasure my friends’ memories as if they were my own.

Jane’s home is a special treat.  It is clean and fresh, but filled with items that signify a well-lived life of love and blessings, of obstacles overcome and dreams yet to be fulfilled.  I stood in Jane’s living room and looked around at the dolls and toys, afghans and doilies, pictures and books.  “Oh, don’t mind the mess,” Jane stated as she waved her hand.

“No, it’s fine,” I assured her.  “I think it’s much cleaner than my apartment.”

“I had a friend over the other day,” Jane told me.  “She looked around the room and said ‘Oh, Jane…are you a hoarder?’  I said, ‘No, I just need a bigger house!’”

I looked at Jane and started to laugh.  “No, seriously,” Jane tried to defend herself.  “I do!  I’m not a hoarder.  I just need a bigger house.”

I couldn’t have thought of a more perfect response.  Life really is all about perspective now, isn’t it?  Does anyone else really know the treasures we hold in our hearts?  People are constantly looking at each other from the outside and being so critical.  Do we ever really look at another person from the inside?  I looked around Jane’s living room again, feeling the love and the kindness that permeated the sacred space.  I thought the room was beautiful.

The whole evening was warm and comfortable as I had dinner with Jane and her husband, played with their blind cat, and explored Jane’s massage room.  It was obviously clear to me.  Jane was not a hoarder.  She is not owned or ruled by things.  She is guided by memories and emotion.  She is buried under kindness and compassion.  She is her own person living her own full life.  Jane’s home reminds me of my favorite saying:“You weren’t meant to fit in; you were made to stand out.”  Jane stands out and I really hope other people see Jane’s happy and determined personality throughout her home and in her life.

At the end of the evening, after a great homemade meal of salad and lasagna, I hugged my friend and her husband good-bye and climbed into my car.  I waved at my friend as I drove away.  We promised that we would stay in touch and not let so much time pass by before we saw each other again.  That was three months ago.  Jane and I have stayed in touch through random messages on Facebook.  We are trying to arrange another time to get together.  She and her husband have gone to Vegas, had relatives visiting from out of town.  We both had holidays, friends who needed our assistance, and work responsibilities.  It doesn’t matter, though.  Jane and I are connected in a cosmic way.  I know Jane and I will see each other again and, over glasses of iced tea with honey, there will be more pictures to look at and many more stories to tell.  We are contradictions and undeniable truths.  We will show each other how we stand out and belong together. But above it all, for now and forever, we are good friends.