Dress Rehearsal: noun. a rehearsal of a play or other performance in costume and with scenery, properties,and lights arranged and operated as for a performance: often the final rehearsal.
This is it! I pick up the rental van on Saturday and Cosmo and I will head out for 4 days. The goal is to live as if we have sold our home (it went on the market this week) and are now living solely out of the van. I will bring it back home Saturday afternoon and pack it up, and once we leave, we will not return until after we take the van back. We will be staying close by, and I’d thought early on that if we get stuck, we can always come back home to pick up anything we forgot, or that I could drop Cosmo off to stay here if the weather was too hot or if he got fussy staying in the van. Then I realized that the whole idea of a “Dress Rehearsal” is to see how this really works. To practice being on the road. To actually live as we will when we have no other place to live.
I’ve spent the week packing and making lists of stuff still left to prepare. I always have a hard time packing for a trip, not sure what clothes, toiletries, camera equipment and electronics I should bring. This is worse. Besides all the usual items, I need to bring dishes, pots, pans, bedding, and food. I want this to simulate, as closely as possible, living in a van full-time . Needless to say, I’m excited and just a tad apprehensive.
I’ve decided that to make this as close to my future life as I can, that we’ll stay a night at a real campground, so we can experience van life with full hookups, showers, nature trails, picnic tables and the great outdoors. But even though it is relatively cheap at just under $30 a night, that will be a rare treat once I’m on the road and living only on my Social Security. $30 a night x 30 nights pretty much eats up my entire monthly budget. Once we go full time, we will be “driveway surfing” when we visit friends, so for two of our practice nights, we will stay with different friends who have offered their driveway and an electrical outlet to plug into. And one night we’ll be sleeping in Walmart’s Parking lot. The reality is that once on the road, there will be times when Free National Park “Boondocking” or BLM (Bureau of Land Management) sites are not close by, and if driving between destinations, Walmart parking lot may be our best bet. My dream is to wake up as often as possible out in nature, to open the van doors and look out at beautiful mountains, streams, forests or oceans and revel in the knowledge that this is my back yard. Unfortunately, some days I’ll open the doors to Walmart asphalt and be thankful that I had a safe place to rest for the night before continuing my journey.
The van I’m renting is a no-frills version of the van I hope to purchase when my building sells. It has no solar panels, no on-board generator, and a limited battery bank. That shouldn’t be a huge problem, but it means no air conditioner without the motor running or being plugged into shore power. That could be tricky in the middle of July. But if we can manage in this van, then life in the upgraded van will be a piece of cake, with lots of solar, lithium ion battery bank, and an under-hood generator that kicks in automatically should battery power drop to a certain level.
There is an expression in American Sign Language that I really like. It translates literally as “Fun none: True business.” I think in English we would say “Serious as a heart attack.” It means “this is no joking matter.” It seems apt for this short adventure. By the end of this trial run, I’ll know for sure if I can do this; if I can really live in a small metal box with a dog. I think the payoffs for learning to do it will far outweigh the few inconveniences we encounter. Wish us luck!