Less is more...

Downsizing Wandering Dave

With room and board taken care of (more on that another day), my major expenses
during the trip will be gasoline and maintenance for the Saturn and some unavoidable ongoing expenses including insurance (health, auto and renter's), communications (phone and internet), taxes, contributions and my rent back in Merced.

I've managed to reduce those costs significantly this week by moving out of my luxuriously spacious 1-bedroom suite on the elegant third floor to a tiny, ground-floor studio at the end of the south wing. The savings should cover the cost of gas and repairs, so I expect my monthly costs on the trip to be no greater than they have been over the past six months or so. That's good news and certainly justifies taking my time and lingering at each stop along the way.

One summer day in 1968, I was driving my Jeep from Colorado to California and took note of the fact that all of my worldly possessions fit in its tiny rear compartment. It occurred to me that I was free to steer that Jeep toward any destination, carrying all of my "stuff" with me toward whatever new adventures
might await me down the road.

Ever since that day I've had mixed feelings about possessions. As subsequent moves required larger vehicles, U-Haul trailers and eventually large rental trucks, I felt the increasing burden of … things.

Of course, it wasn't that simple. Along with material possessions, I acquired new responsibilities, became an important part of other peoples' lives and developed many other new associations and affiliations. But now that I’m a bachelor again and retired, most of those considerations are history.

Between 1968 and 2006, I've moved more than four dozen times. Until recently, each move required the transportation of more stuff than the last.

But in preparation for a year away from most of my possessions, I've downsized. And I am continuing to filter through the remaining flotsam and jetsam to decide what few hundred pounds may accompany me on the road – and how much I should store in my little studio apartment for future use.

Fortunately, although I live in a material world, I'm NOT a material boy. I'm enjoying flashbacks to that day in 1968 and look forward to discovering that, once again, I can carry everything I really need in the back of my vehicle.

Like Steinbeck, I’m heading out in search for America; but I realize that I’m at least as interested in searching for myself.

Being apart from my trappings, so to speak, may help to define David Burke. I am, of course, more than the sum of my possessions. I'm curious to learn whether I'll even miss being in contact with these things – or having a home, for that matter.

I've noticed that time seems to be passing at a rapidly increasing rate since I’ve retired. I no longer can measure time as intervals of work and weekends or vacation periods. Though the holidays still arrive on schedule, they’re no longer savored quite as much because their arrival doesn’t mean an extra day away from work.

I’m going to try to embrace a fairly ludicrous interpretation of Einstein’s theory that as one approaches the speed of light, time begins to pass more slowly.

I’m going to operate under the theory that by keeping on the move for a year, I will – at a minimum -- reduce the sensation that time is passing more quickly. And I’m hoping against all reason that I may actually make time stop or reverse course and that I’ll enjoy some days on the road that remind me of my earlier travels in that jeep I owned nearly 40 years ago.

OK. Maybe I'm not being very lucent at the moment. You'll forgive me, I hope. You see, I'm staring at boxes (thankfully far fewer than before) that I must now unpack as I settle in to my latest new home. I'm not called “Wandering Dave” for nothing, you know.