I used to hate dreads. I lived in Humboldt County for cryin’ out loud. Humboldt is the Trustafarian Dreadlock Mecca of North America. All year long, dirty pot-smoking kids would come up in search of the Humboldt Myth, panhandling their way around, looking for drugs, causing trouble and cluttering downtown Eureka and Arcata with their encampments. Every nasty stereotype about dreadlocks was represented in the North Coast, and I despised that look.
But as the story goes . . . then I hit the road, and everything changed. I stopped making assumptions about people, and then I met a cool Christian gal traveling in a veggie-oil powered bus with her hubby and daughter. And she just happened to sport dreads. She’s a smart, drug-free Mom living a ultra healthy life and defies every negative stereotype about people who wear dreads. She’s a dreadlock-wearing rebel, and if there’s anything that I really respect, it’s a rebel with a cause.
Something about dreads started to intrigue me. You have to possess a strong commitment to grow them right, they’re really practical when you’re on the road, and they look really nice if you maintain them and don’t let them turn into a big peanut looking thing. And they can teach people to stop making assumptions.
Suddenly, I wanted to grow my own. I’ve tried every hairstyle there is, and I still haven’t been happy with any of them. So what the hell. I’m in the process of growing out the shortest haircut I’ve ever had, and by summer, my hair will be long enough to backcomb and begin the process.
They’ll mean even more to me, because my best friend in the world is going to come out and help me do them, since hubby isn’t thrilled about the idea of not being able to run his fingers through my hair again.
When I hear people in their 50s talk about how they wish they had started traveling when they were younger, I know that despite the financial uncertainty that my man and I live with, we made the right decision back in 2007 to chuck our old lifestyle and hit the road.
This great story about a mid-life couple shares the good and the bad about living the vagabondish lifestyle:
Ain’t nothing like a good stitch and bitch session.
And some wine helps too.
Since I hit the road nearly 3 years ago, I’ve tried other hobbies, but I keep coming back to knitting. I don’t really know why, other than it’s the perfect hobby for an RVer. But I never really finish anything because I’m always ripping out my stitches, and what I do make tends to look really, really dorky. I’m too broke to buy the really fancy homespun yarn (notice the HellMart special above), and even if I was crazy enough to buy it, I’m just not good enough to make anything cool with it.
I guess I like the way it makes my mind zone out for a while. It’s meditative, and keeps me from chewing on my fingernails (nasty, I know). But the problem with knitting on the road is, if I’m doing the navigating, chances are we’re going to miss our exit.
But then again who cares? It’s all about the journey, not the destination, right?
Hah, say that to my hubby when I tell him “TURN HERE!” and he has to swing our 40′ rig around a corner on a dime.
Personally, I would’ve changed my name if I married Mr. Craver.
As seen in the super haunted Forest Lawn Cemetary in Brunswick, New York.
Been in Los Angeles for almost 1.5 months now, and I still feel like a fish out of water. Everything screams at me to be more beautiful, spend more money, and eat more food. There are too many distractions to get any meaningful work done. Money making ventures are falling by the wayside as we continue to spend income we don’t have.
Suburbia never changes. Every week, the neighborhood routines repeat their patterns. Each neighbor has a gardener that shows up on different days of the week, all of them generating ear-splitting noises that add to the aural pollution in the air. Kids go to school, parents to go work, dogs stay home and bark lonesome songs in their backyards. Night falls, and everything happens exactly the same when the sun comes up again. It’s all a very good reminder about what I do not want in this lifetime.
The lonesome desert landscape is calling my name. It’s time to go.
Are Stupid Conservative Americans the only humans on the planet who believe global warming is a hoax?
The ignorance of some in our country never ceases to amaze me. Apparently the neocons are putting the word out that the Build-a-Bear company is indoctrinating children into believing in climate change. Their recent webisode series ever so briefly touch on the subject, which has the ignorant masses up in arms, saying that they are preying on innocent children.
Here’s one of the videos. I think they’re more annoying than anything, and I can’t imagine toddlers and kids with the attention span of a gnat sitting through them.
With less than 2 weeks left in the year, it’s time to look back and ponder.
- Did I make good use of my 40th year on earth?
- How much did I really get done?
- What goals did I accomplish?
- Am I happy and fulfilled?
- And what do I want to check off my list next year?
Seems like there’s never enough time to do what I want to do in this life. It astounds me that some famous our powerful people out there can get so much work done and rise to stardom or notoriety or whatever, when I’m just struggling to keep some blogs going and make enough money to live on. What do they know that I don’t?
Next year it starts all over again. The lists, the goals, the trials and tribulations. I can make good use of my time on earth and live in the now, or piss this life away like so many others do.
Hmmmm….guess which route I’m taking?
Caught up in the pace of urban living, I found myself taking short shallow breaths while combating a nauseating feeling in the pit of my stomach as I sat in Friday afternoon traffic in my borrowed SUV.
Whenever I return to my hometown, I never feel like myself. I’m even more oddball than I ever was when I lived here nearly 15 years ago. At least back then I tried to fit in on the outside. My expensive hair and makeup and stylish clothes kept me in the game. But now I stick out. I’m different on the outside too, and it’s obvious I’m a square peg.
During my visits, I hopscotch around the social awkwardness, and keep myself focused on the things that await me outside of this madness called Los Angeles.
It’s good to be back, because it reminds me of how I really do have so much more in life.
Some of us are born to follow, others were meant to strike out on our own path. While I can’t exactly call myself a “leader,” I’m really awful at being a follower. My personality lies somewhere in the middle, which explains why I’ve been happily self-employed for the last 12 years, but don’t want to grow my company into the kind of huge entity that good capitalists are supposed to.
This much I know about myself: I cannot be part of an organization that does not value the individual. So if the company won’t value me for who I am, then I might as well be captain of my own dinghy.
I jumped Satan’s ship earlier this week. There was no way I could tolerate idiot managers breathing down my neck, feeling like a number and being treated even worse that that, for even one more day. I will not sell my soul again for the lure of a paycheck.
Although we barely covered the cost of our rent with this 30 day gig, I got something far more valuable than money can buy out of the deal.
A fire under my butt and a swift kick in the teeth to make our next venture fly . . .
or else live that nightmare over, and over, and over again.
I’d rather not, thank you.
What an eye opener this warehouse job at Satan’s Castle has been. I suppose that my white collar work history has turned me into a wimp, because what I’ve learned is that those who do this kind of work for a living get treated like crap no matter where they make a living.
My own sister, who only finished high school and has worked many of these jobs, informed me of that fact the last time I whined to her. “Welcome to my world!” she said to me.
I feel blessed that there IS an end in sight to this shit job. This week I start working 12 hour days. I go in a 6 am, which means getting out of bed in freezing weather and pedaling to the warehouse at 5am. Well, I think I’m pretty rugged under most biking circumstances, but this is going to put my confidence to the test.
Biking to work under 20 degree, dark and freezing desert skies and battling thorny vines all the way there is either going to make me a real two-wheeled cowgirl, or it’s going to turn me into a wimp and make me hop in my toasty warm Dodge to get to work. We shall see.