The Edge [of all] Journeys

Before we left San Diego I snuck in a helicopter ride (actually the same morning we had to check out of the campground by noon) to shoot video for stock. Hopefully the adventure will more than pay for itself (it better 🙂 ).

Beautiful San Diego was our home for a month. Among other things, we made it to the southwest corner of CA and walked up to the border with Mexico on the beach, we played in the tidal pools at La Jolla and saw the seals and sea lions, we went to a vineyard / winery about an hour north and enjoyed tasting the wines, we played in the ocean in January and February at several different beaches, we enjoyed having a Trader Joe’s close by again, we had cook-outs with dear friends parked right behind us, we made new friends at the campground who routinely gave us fresh tangelos from their family’s tree, we went for an hour (1-way) ride on the 3-level Coastal Train along the coast up to Ocean City, CA had lunch way out at a restaurant on a massive pier and rode back during sunset, we went for walks around Mission Bay where the campground was, and many other adventures besides – all the while enjoying summer in winter.

This is our parking spot about 30 minutes south of Fresno, CA with a beautiful view to the Sierras. We’re staying on the farm of friends of friends and are so blessed to be able to make new friendships and have another taste of community in a place previously foreign to us.

We had an adventurous trip north that included lots of heavy pulling through mountains and an episode of overheating that forced us to pull over. We even lost our pyro gauge and I wasn’t sure if we were going to be able to continue at one point. But we all prayed about it and I realized there really was no option but to throw our trust completely on YHWH and keep going. As soon as the family finished praying, and I came to resolve in my heart and spirit (I was outside under the hood), the pyro gauge came back to life and we pressed on without any other setbacks.

And then there was Bakersfield! Wow. Enough words cannot be found to describe the Bakersfield miracle. We set out from San Diego with directions in hand and campground recommendations from our tangelo friends who travel between their home in Washington state and San Diego every year for the seasons. Our original plan was to head up along the coast and end up in LA and maybe Malibu to connect with friends of friends there. That door closed for a variety of reasons which ended up pushing us through a more easterly route. YHWH confirmed it was the right direction for us as we pulled into a campground in Bakersfield, CA that had been recommended by our tangelo friends. It was around 7:30pm and the office was closed, but I had called ahead and our site number (112) was waiting for us on the door. We pulled into our site after several attempts (it was quite slanted on one side and leveling a camper is everything), the kids exploded out of the truck crying shrieks of banshee freedom, and I began to set up. Enter stage right: very familiar looking gentlemen. Queue the line: “Hey, didn’t we meet you guys in New Mexico?” Turns our we had not only arrived at the same campground, but had been assigned a site immediately next to dear friends we had made at a campground in New Mexico a month and a half earlier. They travel full-time too and homeschool their 5 boys who instant friends with our kids, and we only overlapped in NM for 1 night. They went northwest to Arizona and we went west to California. We weren’t event going to stay in San Diego for a month but were supposed to go to LA and instead ended up in Bakersfield. They were only supposed to be in Bakersfield for a few days (weeks before we arrived), but ended up stuck there for weeks to work out insurance, plates, and a new van after theirs was crushed by a semi (thankfully no one was hurt). And here we wind up weeks later, without staying in touch, parked next to each other at the same campground. I would call it a freak coincidental act of fate except that I have seen YHWH do things like this throughout my entire life.

Bennah and Reayah made it into their blog post about the amazing encounter, and I wish I had pictures of the whole crowd playing in Bakersfield to post here! Here’s Patsy’s post (scroll down to the entry “It’s All About Perspective”):
http://www.kirace.com/index.php?page=blog&bid=1
And here’s Marty’s post about the accident:
http://www.kidologytogo.com/2011/02/a-grateful-heart-is-a-thankful-heart/

Kidology is the children’s pastor ministry they are involved with during their travels. Amazing! All honor to YHWH!

Another highlight from Bakersfield was the not-quite-lukewarm-hot-tube-date. Renee and I had Bennah and Reayah watch the kids after bed time and managed a quick dip in the hot tub. We had Sky in the car seat and rocked him to sleep beside the water. The only thing was the water… it wasn’t even as hot as I’d make my own bath water. I ended up having to jump into the freezing pool and back just to get it to feel “hot” – even if only for a few seconds. But the night was beautiful and it was nice to have a moment of quality hangout time with my wife. That’s probably the first time Renee has ever shivered in a hot tub. Not kidding.

And here we are planting potatoes on the farm where we’re staying! Fun fun fun!

This was going to be a 10-photo post, but I ended up having to write a lot more than I had originally planned… the hour drags on… and I’ll have to make this part 1. More to come!

There are many many stories by way of which I ought to bring this record up to date. And I hope to, but this day stands alone. And I will not (yet) even attempt to add paltry detail in words, for they would distract you from what the pictures have to say:

Life is a river filled with self-reflexive microcosms. The Road.

Mostly it is a constant rushing, a blur of events carrying us incessantly forward, inexorably onward. Time.

But there are moments. An eddy in the currant snags the shore and strands time’s gaze. The river doesn’t stop, doesn’t even slow, but the inertia temporarily presses perspective into a recline between the water and the sky, and it feels like floating inside a transparent womb. There is no up or down, east, west, north or south.

There is no movement but constant motion surrounds. Weightless.

And then time’s tyranny takes account, finds a subject stranded, re-asserts its impatient decree. The womb shatters. And for a fraction of perception everything stops: motion, sound, pulse, vision… every gaze is frozen, pure, unfiltered, and collides into a choice: cling to jagged womb fragments or PLUNGE.

Such chatic contentions consume themselves before they even exist – time reverses upon itself for a span too short to measure and the decision is made before the choice has even penetrated the mind. Falling.

Down.

Then forward, into a vague familiar rushing. Momentums match and fuse. The shore fades away. It’s almost as if nothing changed yet something feels different… there is a dull throbbing.

Several shards of womb removed leave vivid scars of joy. Memories.

Older scars fade slightly.

The rushing intensifies and there is only the river. The Road.

And where did May go I might ask you? Well, at least that wasn’t quite so bad as I was expecting. It seems like 3 months have disappeared, but it has only been 1 + a bit since last post… of course, it HAS practically been months if you don’t count the latest posts which haven’t had a whole lot to do with what we’ve actually been up to here in Pennsylvania. And now the clock is already winding down to another departure probably by July… less than another month away. Yikes.

So, here’s the highlight reel. Another crazy thing is that I’ve hardly touched my cameras (relatively speaking), though I do have enough great video clips to cut a few more episodes of Joureys… like so many noble projects collecting dust on the back burners. But here are some of the things that have been filling our days here in PA (besides the work we do in our virtual worlds):

There are some amazing storms that blow through from time to time.

We've been feasting on strawberries. Renee and the kids have helped weed and pick, and every couple of days we get a new big bowl-full from the garden. This was an actual, single strawberry that Reayah found.

Our friends set their pool up over a week ago, and it was added to our daily routine.

Ever since our friends got three new cows, Joy has been smitten. Every single day, several times, we here the familiar refrain: "go see cows? i like cows!"

And of course there's all the farm stuff: I made an attempt at seeding a bit of pasture with grass, and Renee has been having a ball doing all kinds of planting and weeding and picking. Of course the kids are pitching in too.

No country farm would be complete without a creek. Even with the pool set up, this is still pretty much a daily necessity. The creek is so versatile it has hosted forts (under the bridge), dam-making, snake killing, rope swinging, splashing, wading, falling in, and so many other things over the weeks.

Flying down the long driveway hill on scooters is also nearly a daily event. The most common question (the younger boys have to ask first): "can I go down the hill 2 times?"

For more pics of our adventures here over the last couple months, check out my latest smugmug galleries, which I am once again finally getting caught up with (there’s roughly 35 pics in each, and they are still uploading, so if they’re not done when you check, you can always check back again later):

• Apr 2010
• May 2010

As far as other news… everything is new. We were planning to have left from here a long time ago, but this place has been so fantastic for getting work done (the kids are incredibly content having so much to do outside all the time), and there have been important things that YHWH has kept us around for. It has been a real blessing to have the nearly constant community and fellowship with our friends here.

There is still quite a bit of uncertainty about what will unfold day-to-day, but we’re planning to hit a garlic harvest in July and meet up with some of our dear Colorado friends there, and then head back and still make a run at heading up the East Coast after that. We’ll see… as we’ve discovered, everything is subject to change 🙂

What a amazing week… well and a bit I guess. We had an amazing Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread for the last week here in PA, met some incredible people, lots of fellowship, meals, sharing, learning together etc. Still managed to put in nearly 40 hours on projects even with 3 Sabbaths in there. Don’t know how I pulle d . adf firgh Zzzzzz….

wha … What? what was I saying? Oh right, anyway. This will all be more cursory than it should be because I am in the process of digging out of a 3-month photographic hole. I have 2 down and 1 to go and will share in a second. So back to updates: the kids are in wild country mode: scraping knees, swinging on rope swings, playing in the creek, cutting bare feet, flying down the hill on scooters, running around with friends, that sort of thing.

Other highlights: Reayah got to be be a flower girl in her first wedding experience, I just spent three hours with Bennah “organizing” his bed (a bio hazmat operation I can assure you)… actually that might not make much sense to you unless I also provide the additional detail that the kids keep all their personal things / toys / collections at the foot of their beds, Joy is both participating in and resisting potty training at the same time quite nicely, Zach and Jaiden are quite the buddies now and while Zach is convinced we are going to build a flying car together this summer – one that actually flies – Jaiden just wants to make sure that he is doing whatever his brothers are doing.

It’s raining gently outside… such a soothing thing… totally different experience than from inside a house. I got two new drain spouts attached to the rain channel today (I knocked them off a couple months ago when a branch reached out across an otherwise reasonable turn radius and scraped a few little holes in our rubber roof that we discovered a few weeks later during a massive downpour in the form of extra water we didn’t need in the kids room). I patched the holes up earlier in the week.

Today was laundry day. And grocery day. And pick up the new door latch from the RV dealer finally day.

I have to tell you about our main door latch. Ok. Proof positive that things are engineered to break – this was the most ridiculous design ever – back in Florida the tab that was responsible for making the entire handle and latch mechanism work broke clean off and we were stuck inside the trailer until I disassembled the whole thing. I tried everything to avoid having to buy another cheap replacement that would just cause another head ache later. I am not kidding – here are some of the random things I employed in various attempts to rig it (some of which lasted longer than others): aluminum from a beer can, JB weld (but it was too old to last) and a hex nut, a screw, a modified golf tee (still inside the spring to control handle travel distance), hockey tape by itself, and hockey tape with pop-sickle stick (which is actually working fairly well so far). But the moment of truth will come and I better get a proper replacement in there. It has been quite a thorn in my side.

Anyway, enough boring RV life drivel. Here are some pictures! Including some from the solar panel project that I added to the truck.

January 2010

February 2010

Solar Panel Project

So, let the movie parties begin! I have finally come out of the video editing, rendering, and uploading mire bruised and scarred but victorious. After no less than 3 attempts on each, uploads and deletes, codec woes, and other sundry technology battles – Episodes 1-3 of Journeys (the quasi-documentary) are LIVE!

The best way to watch them is on the new page I created just for this purpose. I’m playing with a very sweet new tool by Apture, and I think you will find the viewing experience quite fun! – Go to The Movie (up in the top menu) to watch all the Journeys episodes. I will also update that page as I add episodes in the future.

Or, you can also watch them on my YouTube channel.

I’ve also updated The Map with the last legs of our travels.

We are getting ready to leave Georgia in a few short days and work our way back up to Pennsylvania for spring. We’re hoping to swing through Hampton Roads (VA) and Washington, DC along the way and drop in on some friends in our old stompin’ grounds.

Two months or so ago I was out driving around near Denver with my 4 year old boy Zach. He was having a rare turn up in the front seat, and looking out through the windshield towards the mountains he suddenly piped up with an epiphany: “Dad!!! I know how to get to the end of nowhere!” he exclaimed rather passionately.

How else can a father reply? “Oh yeah?” I said – not at all sardonically. “How’s that?”

To which Zach confidently replied, “You just keep driving that way and don’t stop!” while pointing straight ahead out the window.

Well, today I made good on my promise to take him to the end of nowhere some time. We spent the afternoon on the furthest SE point of the United States to which one can drive – the southern end of Hwy 1 – the edge of Key West, FL. We have literally driven the entire length of Florida now, entering about a month ago on the far western tip of the panhandle and driving first east and then south along the coast, and then cutting over through alligator alley along the Everglades, and then down Hwy 1 across all the keys. WOW.

What a beautiful place. 75 degrees F today and we played in the ocean in February. Crazy. I’d love to stay longer but it is Expensive with a capital E. Here are some shots from the day (keep reading below the gallery to get caught up on the rest of everything).

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Our next plan is to head up for Georgia where it’s still not all that cold, but away from the majority of migratory retirees which improves the campground rates; hunker down for maybe a month and knock out a ton of work that is looming. Which reminds me I still need to hit some of the highlights from the last month in my typical, inadequate bullet fashion. Here are the primary memories:

• Gabe and Heather’s wonderful southern hospitality and opening their home and land and lives to us for a couple weeks
• The kids playing endlessly together with nary an issue that needed adult mediation; from building robots out of a busted, rusted out 8-track player they found in the woods, to planning their treehouse, to whacking golf balls all over the yard, to jumping on the trampoline and playing in the dirt… it was country bliss like I grew up in
• Early morning hunting adventures
• Bennah’s first lesson on a real rifle
• Tinkering in the studio, recording the band’s first recording, writing a song on Gabe’s old guitar over the course of 2 weeks in the short 2-3 minute segments of time that I was in there each night to monitor my children during their pre-bedtime potty rituals
• Getting overloaded on baby girl cuteness in one place
• Shifting gears in the work arena when our project with La Vie Labs and Clairte did not work out like we had planned and hoped; and focusing all my energies on a new, exciting project
• Golfing in a cow pasture with Gabe and our two oldest boys (the “hole” was an old rusted out washing machine in the corner of the field)
• (And for those who have not noticed my not-so subtle title change on the blog yet) FINDING OUT WE ARE GOING TO HAVE A BABY #6 probably some time in October. Blessings upon blessings (and a bit freaked out at first) but children are a gift from YHWH and He has filled our quiver to be sure.

And that was just northern FL. Then we headed south and landed in Bradenton for a couple days and were extremely well cared for by dear (new) friends – parents of friends that we had grown very close to in Colorado. In fact, if you love garlic, they grow a whole bunch up in Ohio every year and it is absolutely incomparable to what you can buy in the store: Charlie’s Gourmet Garlic! You can watch the video that I edited a while back to get an idea of what Charlie and his farm are like – it’s the 2nd one down on this page: http://doctorbeautiful.com/blog/?page_id=48 So, while we were with them, they gave us and helped us pickle about 2.5 quarts of garlic! In about 3 more weeks the heat will be gone, but all the yummy healthy goodness will be intact. Thanks again Charlie!!!

They also hang out in FL for a few months in the winter so we were parked in Bradenton near their home down there. The tricky thing was that it was just a parking lot designed for RV visitors, and fine for sleeping, but with no electric, water, or sewer not well suited for working or living very long. With some critical work that came up we had to relocate. Ironically, one of the absolute nicest campgrounds in the overall area was also the cheapest (although it wasn’t all that cheap). So, we headed back up north about 30 miles and ended up managing to stretch it out for a week at the Fort De Soto Park Campground. That’s where the last five photos from the previous post were taken. 5 of those days we had a beach-front site. Fabulous. During that time:

• I worked my tail off and got a lot accomplished on a new work project
• The kids got sandy and wet pretty much every day
• We had to fend off the raccoons
• We met two other amazing families who live in that area and are close friends of close friends. They also opened their home and lives to us and we had a wonderful time getting to know them and their children, hitting the hot tub, feasting and fellowshipping together. It never felt like we had only just met.
• We explored Fort De Soto and the beaches there; and I managed to get a few pictures in… still way under quota right now.

And I’m probably forgetting something else important, but then we headed down here on a mission to get to the End of Nowhere. And so here we are. Tomorrow we head north once again.

We have been having so many adventures in Florida – both with work and with play and with meeting some amazing new friends. One of these days here soon I am going to write about some of it (in theory). I should have gone to bed long ago as it is, and I’m going to try to wake up the kids in about an hour and a half to catch the space shuttle launch at 4:30am…

But, for now, here are some visuals. I know they say a picture is worth a thousand words, but I could write at least a few thousand words about the stories weaving in and out of each of these pictures.

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