Park Model Arrives

We were getting antsy waiting out the northern bad weather which delayed the arrival of the park model by a week but it finally showed up early Wednesday morning. The transport guy did an excellent job of guiding in the forty footer past the front planter, side block walls and privacy wall as though he were threading a needle. It did arrive with some damage to the interior but of Marc’s doing, as the mattress and box spring shifted badly, smacking the bank of drawers, breaking two beyond repair. Marc will need to make new ones.

Backed into its new spot, we immediately noted an enhanced mountain view, especially from the front deck and living room bay windows, gained from its higher stance and position on the lot. We liked that so much, that for the time being, we’ve decided to leave it there although that does eliminate our rental RV spot. We should have just enough room in front for visitor’s short stays however.

Since this could be a permanent location Marc decided it needed to be moved over about two feet to accommodate the side setback requirement of the lot. Ever the inventive one, Marc rigged a roller system on an old piece of trailer tongue, which he winched from the park model tongue to the end of the piece of steel and ratchet by ratchet, inch by inch, he moved the front of the park model over.

Having made the trip through Central Oregon’s red cinders, the park model arrived very filthy so my first order of business was getting her cleaned inside and out. Marc will leave tomorrow for Bend where he will pick up the storage shed which holds all the interior contents so when he returns in about a week we’ll have our work cut out for us.

Can You Say Relaxed?

What better way to wait something out than being socially active! We’re hopeful the park model arrives early this week but meanwhile we’ve enjoyed Dale and Vera’s company and a neighbor’s party last evening. The weather has been mostly cooperative for al fresco dining and partying and the first order of business was enjoying Dale’s fish tacos. After that, Dale helped Marc erect his “redneck shop” over the welding table and they got busy on diagnosing the problem with the driveshaft of Dale’s toad. Vera was busy enjoying the shade in a different manner.

Don and Susie, fellow bikers and friends of several years just down the street apiece, hosted a party last evening in honor of Susie’s upcoming birthday. It was a treat to see their finally-finished new home as about 40 others gathered for quite a spread. Being a retired firefighter Don did some firehouse cooking of three different types of spaghetti sauces and the full bar greased the lively conversations of all attending. It was a warm evening and Marc jumped in to help serve the long conga line of hungry guests. The other gentleman helping out is Bruce, (who lives next door to Don in another new home) a Canadian from BC, who showed pictures of his lovely “main” home on a large mountainous lake, complete with private dock and big boat to go with the stupendous views and needlessly offering the comment “this is the view I wake up to each day”. Some people really know how to live; can you tell I’m mighty envious? In the middle is the host Don and of course, Marc, looking striking in his flowered apron causing quite a stir amongst the ladies!

I will say it once again: nowhere have we ever found it so easy to make friends and meet people with similar interests than good 'ol Yuma. Thanks Don and Susie for such a wonderful evening!

Home

One thing about the desert southwest is vibrant colors are OK and even sought after to add to the ambiance. Instead of looking like a slice of graffiti in the ghetto, colors seem to enhance the natural muted desert tones and create an interesting juxtaposition; an intrigue.

One of the first pleasures of re-feathering my nest here in Yuma was to visit Lowe’s and buy some annuals and some of my favorite flowers—hibiscus and bougainvillea. Now the place looks cheery!

It was a hectic arrival with unpacking some of the things we had brought along in the vehicles; plus Marc added a water softener temporarily to the RV. It will eventually be transferred to the park model once that is set up. We also uncovered the spa and got it going so we’ll be able to enjoy a good hot soak by tomorrow morning. We pruned all the trees and shored and tied up the front Palo Verde which blew down this winter; fertilized everything, and pulled and sprayed the weeds. We put the patio furniture back together and got it arranged for entertaining. We’ve barbecued; and the back of my neck is already sunburned!

Our social calendar is already bulging too. We have four dinner invitations, one of which will be my cousin Dale arriving tomorrow in his motorhome for a couple days in order to cook his Ling cod fish tacos for us, a special treat. It will be a nice visit and likely could involve some cold cervezas and desert hi-jinks like target shooting.

Life is entirely too pleasant here; perfect weather, except for a being a little breezier than we’d like, but warm enough that in early morning just as the sun is about to come up I can sit outside with my first cup of coffee, turn on the water fountain, and listen to the doves cooing. I really do love it here. Now we await enough of the snow going away over the Cascades that the transport truck can finally bring the park model and we can get to work!

Migration--in Search of Sun

It’s a phenomena best experienced in person to watch the yearly migration of the snowbirds. We assess the rigs heading north and determine about one in four vehicles is some type of RV. We felt sorry for them; wanted to shout “You’re too early; don’t go” for as we took our leave-taking from Bend on Friday morning we were buried in snow and then had to endure driving out through it much of the day through eastern Oregon and on south to Winnemucca, our first stop. Temperatures were only 28 as we headed out from there our second morning on I-80, ice-covered in spots; to connect with the main arterial for snowbird travel, Hwy. 95.

Thankfully, our next stop at Bailey’s Hot Springs in Beatty, NV is everything the doctor ordered save for cloudy skies. Arriving in turtleneck and sweatshirt we are a little overdressed for the 56 degrees we find about 4 p.m. but the hot spring baths soon sooth us into a stupor and an early bedtime for another early start Easter Sunday.

Morning dawns clear and only mildly nippy to our now-accustomed-to-the-cold northern bones. By the time we pull over to pump fuel from the Freightliner’s auxiliary saddle tank into the main tank at Indian Springs, NV just 40 miles north of Vegas, it is already nearing 65. Vegas, in what must be a first, is a piece of cake to maneuver through due to lack of traffic but the elevated freeway beats the rig mercilessly since we are double towing the car and everything articulates against each other. South of Searchlight after the roller-coaster portion of the Hwy. 95 we break apart and I drive so it doesn’t continue to beat the car up so badly. Another on-coming RVers runs off into the dirt shoulder, over corrects and throws rocks straight at us, breaking the Freightliner windshield in a two inch broad shatter. Ever resourceful; Marc tapes it with red duct tape in hopes of mitigating the run until he can return to Bend and his windshield repair kit. We don’t have glass insurance coverage and we figure a windshield for the truck would run at minimum $500—an expense we certainly don’t need right now.

Taking Hwy. 95 south through Arizona, which we consider a better road than the comparable Hwy. 95 south on the California side of the Colorado, we join a lot of traffic; RV and otherwise, mainly pickups pulling boats. The water is packed with a plethora of water toys and ski boats, pontoon boats and fishing boats, all out enjoying this stupendous weather. The desert is also abloom through this region; green, verdant, and sporting a vast array of wildflowers.

Another hour brings us to Plamosa Rd long term boondocking area of the infamous Quartzsite, better known as just Q to RVers. It’s only another 2.5 hours to Yuma but I am ready to just park in the quiet desert and decompress and drink in the sun and the balmy temperature. Boondocking out by ourselves like this is fun we’ve really missed lately after our crowded RV park stays. Even Tucker likes it better as he contemplates the horizon for anything moving. Official desert rat status starts tomorrow; but totally in the moment I notice the current temp: 82. Ah, mission accomplished! Migration complete.

Fancy

The crowd erupted into a cacophonous roar and moved as one to their feet as the ceiling-hung screens flashed still photos and then glimpses of moving, glittering silver. She emerged up three steps onto stage—her low cut silver top shimmering over black, tight, boot cut jeans, accentuated by flaming long red hair and her signature mile wide impish grin. Reba had arrived. As she flashed that famous smile the crowd went into an absolute frenzy and before saying one word she burst into her first song. My daughter and I are among 17,000 others watching a country mega-show concert in the Tacoma Dome on free tickets, less than 100 feet from the stage: headlined by George Strait, fleshed out with help from Reba, and warmed up by LeAnn Womack. None of them disappoint but it is truly Reba who steals the show—owning that title most have already hung on her years ago: Diva. For a tiny woman on stage her presence looms larger than life and she truly is a thrill to watch. She pours her heart out with glee for an hour and a half and never even breathes hard. After we all sing Happy Birthday to her (March 28, which also happens to be Brandon and Rachael’s first anniversary), she leaves the stage finished with her set to more endless cheering but nothing like what will ensue next as the foot stomping demands for an encore bring her back for a heart-stopping, insanely loud rendition of “Fancy”, in another shimmering flash of red dress and high heels. Man, what a performer!

Daughter had a weekend off and I had need for a visit before the move so I drove over a nasty pass filled with slush from the morning’s unseasonable snow storm and made the long trek to Tacoma Friday. It’s been a fun-filled, too short few days and I will return to Bend on Monday for another round of our move. Our intentions are to try and leave Bend on Thursday with the RV. Unfortunately the weather report isn’t looking the greatest and I suspect we could even have some snow &/or rain to deal with through eastern Oregon and northern Nevada. After a long, lousy winter, it will be a relief to drop the four thousand foot in elevation once south of Tonopah to truly go from winter’s grip to immediate summer in Yuma’s already high 80 degree temps.

Meanwhile, today will be enjoyed doing some wine-tasting with Rachael as I soak in the last of the Pacific Northwest ambiance.

A Chapter Ends

I like this picture for what it represents—a tree leaning out over a cliff, trying to grow one direction yet obviously pushed so often and so long by gale force winds it can only grow limbs in the opposite direction to the blast. I figured it must be some type of metaphor for our lives.

Hope is a hard thing to hang on to at times. It’s become very sad, this ending to our dream of a vacation/retirement nest at the coast. The perfect juxtaposition to our Yuma lot; it would have afforded a comfortable temperature migration yearly--on into our sunset years. Little did we know when we purchased this park model that in just a couple short years we would have trouble affording even this tiny trailer.

Everyone knows the country is in terrible shape economically, but not everyone knows the terrible disconnect I see going on between those who have jobs and those who don’t. I’ll tell you a little of what it feels like and a little of what it has done—just in hopes that if you’re one of the lucky ones you stop occasionally to be thankful. For those contemporaries who retired in time and missed this bullet or those who never lost their job, there may have been some belt-tightening or a sense that they should cut down on spending. But their financial pathways were already set on a course that in all likelihood probably hasn’t changed that much. It becomes very easy for them to think “well, why don’t those people just get out and get a job?” Whoa there: it isn’t that easy any more.

In life, it’s all about timing. Marc and I didn’t always make the smartest career moves and do admit to stopping and smelling the roses on more occasions than we probably should have. To us, that was called “living our lives” instead of “slaving away our lives”. Given the nature of both of our businesses, real estate and construction, there was never the opportunity to work for just one employer with a fat benefits package; in fact hardly any of them even offered a 401 plan. It is the nature of construction particularly that companies run out of projects and it becomes impossible for them to keep on personnel that have no work to do. We had frequent periods of unemployment. Add in a couple of extreme stock market meltdowns and our retirement savings is permanently crippled. We had no intentions to retire, really. It just wasn’t a financial possibility for us to ever consider so we didn’t.

We stand on the edge of a precipice the likes of which we’ve had no prior experience with. Never before have we not been able to get some response from our employment attempts. Anyone with a steady job cannot know the depth of the trauma of going without work for such an extended time and the harm it does to permanently change people. The destructive force of having no one consider you worthy of hiring extends far beyond the financial ramification of earning no income and doesn’t take long to eat into your psyche, soul, sense of self, and your outlook on life. In our case, it’s taken a heavy toll financially—to the point where there is a very real possibility we will never recover. Well, let’s face it—there will be no true recovery back to square one for there will never be time to replace the retirement dollars we are now burning through to live on. Even if dollars can eventually be put back into an IRA account, we don’t have long enough to live for them to ever mature and grow to their previous amount (which was pitiful to begin with).

This experience has aged us tremendously. It is ruining our health; we are now neglectful of conditions and needed tests because we have no health insurance. It has sapped our confidence, our lightness of step, and something as basic as our joy in living and finding good in each day. Many days are not good—they reek of worry, tempest and tempers, and the very worst, indecision. What if we do this? What if we go there? Should we go there? Alas, we tried and it all cost money. But we will try again—our journey to Yuma isn’t one we would have chosen, but one totally of necessity, where we can cut expenses to the very barest of bones because we own our land outright and the cost of living there is about the lowest we can imagine anywhere. But Yuma’s unemployment rate also hovers at 29%.

It’s probably a good thing we don’t know what lies in store for our future. It’s hard to imagine at our ages a good ending to this story but we keep striving for a better one. We will miss the ocean, we will miss this state we have called home for over twenty years, and we will miss our family, who are mostly all here. We’re on our way very soon; turning that page onto a new chapter. Anyone out there write books? Please give us a happy ending, will you?

The Countdown

Time has a way of slipping away when we least expect it and we find ourselves on the final countdown of our time in Coos Bay. Well, I am in Coos Bay until next week at least; Marc is already heading down Nevada’s highways south to Yuma with our first load.

The park model is still in great disarray given that everything must be emptied out and taken down. We are loading boxes into our motorcycle cargo trailer which will then be taken to Bend, unpacked and transferred into another storage type trailer which will be placed on our lot. That will make the trip to Yuma on top of Marc’s long flatbed trailer. If you’re thinking this man has lots of trailers you’d be right: I think the count is something like ten of them!

In between the bouts of work and dodging the coast’s recent spate of nearly constant rain, we enjoyed an evening’s barbecue with our friends Paul and Virginia over some T bone steaks and a bushel of fresh oysters. Boy, we’re sure going to miss the seafood!