Where Are You From?

Almost daily someone asks "Where are you from?" I find this an awkward question partially because my answers are awkward.

I start by saying, "We were formerly from Scottsdale, Arizona." If they want more and they always do, I have a couple of choices. I can say,  "We sold our home last winter and are now homeless people living out of our car." Now this is true but it is a real conversation stopper so I rarely say this.  My other answer has been that "we are political refugees from the United States." This is a conversation starter. Everyone is sympathetic and has plenty to say on this subject. Which is why I sometimes give answer #1 instead. The last thing I want to do is talk politics. Indeed we left home to avoid talking about it. And anyway, since the election last week I feel a little less alienated.

But the question continues. Where are we from and where do we want to be from? We started our travels in Portugal because we had heard good things about it and thought perhaps we would want to live there for a while. However, we found it a nice place to visit but wouldn't want to live there. And, I still think about where should we live every day.

Do you know any single people who are so fussy about what they want and don't want in a date or mate that they find it hard to connect with someone? I think that we are that way about finding a place to settle down. We are so clear about what we are looking for and what we don't want that no place has it all and no place feels like home. And yet eventually we will need to pick a place. The result of the elections made a small difference. Or did it? I see that evil Joe Ariapo was not only pardoned by Trump but ran for US Senate in the primaries in this last election. Arizona offers a great quality of life but I am not willing to put up with crap like that again.

I often meet seniors who have moved recently and they don’t seem as troubled as I about making a bad decision. Recently I met someone building their retirement dream home on 10 acres in a town with no medical services (a doctor visits once a week) and the nearest hospital is an hour away. Am I obsessing or is he naive?

We are about to take a cruise down to South America. Every single person we meet will ask, "Where are you from?" I have about three more weeks to come up with a suitable and sociable answer.

Shopping in my Closet

The past 10 months have been a non-stop opportunity to re-evaluate my relationship to possessions. Of course, we all know it is much easier to get new stuff than get rid of stuff, but I had no idea how hard it was going to be not to accumulate new possessions. I am traveling light and have done a good job not to get new 'stuff'. Three months in Europe and all I bought was one scarf. But now that I am regrouping it is a greater struggle not to get attached to the things from the storage locker.

We arrived back in Arizona a few days ago and are spending a month here before heading to South America for the winter. The first thing we did was visit our storage space. When we sold our home we sold or gave away most of our furniture and possessions, but we are storing some living room furniture, bedroom furniture, and our clothes. 

This is literally everything we own 

Franklin warned me that the storage lockers were packed tight floor to ceiling and I probably would not be able to find my camera. It is sad but true. It is cheaper to buy another camera than hire movers to all this stuff around. But I do want a camera for our next year of travel. The thrill of iPhone photography has worn off and I need more zoom than the phone offers. I like my old camera and have extra batteries and a charger so it makes sense- at least to me- to buy the identical 5 year old camera. 

Even without having access to most of the items we are storing,  I did find some treasures as I went shopping in my closet. First of all, everything is exactly my size and my taste which makes this much better than shopping in a store. I have not ventured yet into the wardrobe boxes that hold most of my clothes, (partially because one is 6 or more feet in the air) nor gotten into my bureau. I just found some misplaced items but each one delights me. Two or three new dancing outfits, a cashmere sweater, a denim jacket, some dancing shoes, a shawl, my bicycle. Every find is a thrill. It is just my taste! I don't see anything I don't love because I gave away everything I didn't love last year. 

When I say misplaced items what I mean is this. Our house sold the first day on the market and we had only 10 days to move out. I had already been selling things online for a year so some of the furniture was already gone but during those last 10 days I gave away three truckloads of furniture. And while I don’t remember it clearly,  at the very end someone must have been just throwing random stuff into boxes. Anyway, I could access a couple of boxes with mismatched stuff which are kind of fun to look through. but make no sense. A bicycle helmet, a sweater, a purse, old letters. Combinations like that. 

Scottsdale looks wonderful to us too. What a beautiful town! Indeed I have fallen in love with it again, particularly after it elected a Democrat senator for the first time since 1988. 

Anyway, the living out of our car portion of our travels is over for a while. We head out soon on a cruise to South America. We're not sure where we are going or how long we'll be gone but plan to continue our usual Portland/Canada/Portland life late next spring. I'll be blogging again, as I usually do when I travel. Talk to you again soon.