Winners

Many, many thanks to all those who bought tickets and to those who came out to the Brickhouse… you raised $264, exactly the right amount to pay for the modifications to make my headlights BC-legal! The rest of the money I should be able to borrow from family, so hopefully I get my home back soon.

Tova Krentzman won the cash prize of $174, and Amy Thompson, Cory Fitzpatrick, and Meera Shah won invitations to a dinner party in the van, time and date TBA. Once it happens you’ll get the full report here!

I also want to thank all the people who’ve shared or offered to share their homes… it looks like I won’t have time to stay at all of those places, but it makes such a difference knowing that I’ll always have a place to go to. Thank you!!!

SAVE THE HAMSTER!!! Fundraiser and party

AAaauuuuughh!! I still have many more entries to write about the road trip, but first I have some terrible news (the short version): my Nova Scotia insurance ran out just as I returned to BC. My new BC insurance required a safety inspection, aaaand the van didn’t pass. That was due both to wear on the vehicle (weird elbow joints and ball joints) and to strange attributes of being a right hand drive import (custom modificated headlights now required). Total cost to fix: $2000-2400. My net worth: a few hundred. Income: $0. I’ve just been accepted back to my old work on call, so hopefully some shifts will be coming soon.

But in the meantime, I don’t have my van, which means that I’m… well I don’t want to say homeless, because I have lots of kind friends I can stay with… let’s just say I’m even more nomadic than usual. More nomadic than I want to be.

So we’re having a fundraiser here at Going Nomadic, and Stage 1 is a 60/40 draw… in other words you can donate money to the cause, and in return you get a chance (or many chances) to win 40% of the total proceeds! Here’s the price breakdown:

• 1 ticket = $10
• 2 tickets = $15
• 3 tickets = $20
• 5 tickets = $30

You can get the tickets from me in person if you’re in Vancouver (if you don’t have my contact info you can reach me by making a comment below), or you can get them online by donating at Paypal (see the link at the top right there?). I’ll put the tickets aside for you and email you their numbers. The draw will happen at 9pm on Sunday Nov 20 at the Brickhouse, 730 Main street, in Vancouver. I invite all of you to come on down for the draw, partly so that you can see that everything’s being done fair and square, and partly because I have to turn everything into a party :)

I know things are hard for everyone these days, so even if you can’t afford a ticket yourself, you could help me out by spreading the word far and wide. Thanks everyone!

~j

Hamster in LA

Hamster in New Mexico

Hamster in Oklahoma

Hamster in New York

San Diego

Phenomenal day. I’m here visiting a friend from school, and we go out to see the Salk Institute, another architectural icon, this one by Louis Khan. It’s closed, but we get to walk around it and bask in the glory. Behind the building is a trail that we follow down, down… through an ever-more incredible gulley eroded into the sandstone cliff, until we scuttle onto the most beautiful beach ever. Maybe this is ho-hum for the locals, but to discover this by surprise is so exhilarating we give each other a big hug and just start running down the beach. We see dolphins leaping out of the water, fer chrissakes!!! This is Paradise.

Interstate 8, Yuma to San Diego

My poor van, we’ve bonded so much on this trip.  Back in March my mechanic in Halifax tried 3 times to adjust the throttle properly and couldn’t manage it, so ever since then it’s been sluggish accelerating for the first push from 0-20km/h, with a big cloud of black smoke spewing out the back each time. All the way across the country it’s been struggling bravely… drastically slowed down by steep hills, strong headwinds, high altitude. I’m amazed it’s gotten me this far, and much as I’d love to drive something with a bit more oomph, I’m loving my loyal little hamster more than ever.

Fortunately I reach the In-Koh-Pa Mountains just as the day is cooling off: as the road starts to climb there’s a sign telling drivers to turn off the air-con to avoid overheating, and as the climb continues I see several dozen car-sized scorch marks on the shoulder, where cars have literally caught fire. The mountains don’t look solid at all, they look like mountain-sized piles of gravel. Near the top of the climb is the coolest little tourist attraction, an old rock tower built in the 20s that houses an odd assortment of relics from all over the world, as well as a rock garden carved by some old eccentric into tunnels and passageways and goofy animals. I love it!

Scottsdale

Scottsdale Arizona is the unfriendliest place for vandwellers I’ve ever experienced. It’s an elite suburb of Phoenix, a perfect grid of faux Santa Fe mansions, each one dropped onto a massive lot, with stucco fences, manicured palm trees, perfect cacti. Miles of sidewalk, but no one walks here. No parking either: even if I drove a Range Rover I’d stick out, just by virtue of parking on the street.

I’ve stopped here for the night because in the morning I’ll tour Taliesin West, another project of Frank Lloyd Wright’s that just happens to be on my route. In one of his financial low points FLW decided to establish a desert compound where apprentices could pay to come work with him. It jump-started the most generative and inventive period of work in his life, in which he designed the Guggenheim and Fallingwater. When he established Taliesin West in the late 30’s there was nothing here but desert; Scottsdale has grown right up to it’s border, but Taliesin still has a sizable piece of desert property where today’s students go out and build the shelters they design.

It also has about a kilometer of driveway before you get to the main gate, with signs along the way saying that you can’t park there… but I park there anyway because it still seems more hospitable than anywhere in town.  As I pull in I see two big stags in my headlights, and when I turn the car off there’s something extra peaceful about being at the edge… almost in the wild but somehow sill feeling the cars and warm concrete of Phoenix.

Cohabiting in Arizona

Arcosanti is a group of people in the desert north of Pheonix led by a 92-year-old architect named Paolo Soleri. He’s developed a set of theories he calls Arcology, whereby people would live in very dense, self-supporting communities that minimize their impact on the earth in large part by eradicating the need for the car. They’ve been building Arcosanti for the last forty years as a test case, what they call an “urban laboratory”.

They have a 5 week workshop that I’ve wanted to do for years, but this trip of course I only have time for the 1 hour quickie tour. The place feels a bit surreal: concrete arcs, circles and squares sprinkled with slender Italian cedars, an interesting retro-seventies future style. Windchimes are everywhere (the community sells them to fund the project), and the place has a creative, lively feel, although we saw hardly any people.

High density living seems to be theme today… strange that it should be so in Arizona, land of urban sprawl and vast empty desert. In the morning I saw the ruins of a complex of the Holovi people, a masonry apartment block three stories high that housed a thousand people, cultivating corn in the desert and making painted coal-fired pottery that still litters the ground. The Hopi people who live 60 miles to the north are descended from the old inhabitants; their oral traditions say that they left because the area’s mosquitoes became unbearable. Further south, I visit what is still referred to erroneously as “Montezuma’s Castle”, a stunning fortress built in caves tucked high in a cliff face. Around 35 people lived here together for a few hundred years; it isn’t known why they left.

I think Paolo is right, our future depends on learning how to function better as tight communities. People keep talking about ‘green’ building as if it only meant energy savings or materials, but it’s the very form of the single family dwelling that’s so wasteful of space and resources. Yes we all need space and privacy, but perhaps through thoughtful design we can have those needs met while also enjoying the ecological and social benefits of closer proximity. One day I’ll come back to Arco; I want to be part of the experiment.

Family (New Mexico)

Beatrice had a cart that she pushed from town to town in Russia, trading and selling goods to make a living. Being nomadic already (like me!), she was well-prepared to make tracks for a new life elsewhere when the revolution started brewing. But in one town on her way east a man named Jacob saw her, caught up with her on the road, then asked her to marry him. She said yes. Jacob took his new wife to Canada, where they got married and had three children. Jacob sold men’s clothing, and one day a man from the old country walked into his store. They talked about places and people they’d known, then the man asked to have an overcoat Jacob had for sale. Jacob said he was running a business, he couldn’t just give it away. The man said if he didn’t give it to him, that he would ruin his life, but Jacob refused. Next the man went to Jacob’s home, where he found Beatrice and told her that Jacob was still legally married to a wife in the old country, and thus their marriage was illegal and her children were all bastards. Jacob came home that day to find all the belongings that Beatrice considered his out on the front porch, and indeed he never recovered.

I’m in New Mexico now with my aunt Silva, hearing stories from my mother’s side. Silva moved down to this beautiful place three years ago to build a life with her wife Amber, who is from here. Again, we’ve had less contact over the years than other families might have had, but those rare occasions we do get to connect are always a pleasure. I’m really happy to get to see them and their new home.

Amber and the cottonwoods

It’s stunning here. The arroyos are packed with Cottonwoods, and I’ve arrived just as they all turn flaming yellow. The cliffs are deep red, and the air smells incredible. It’s not so good for my poor little van though; apparently diesels don’t do so well in the high altitude. Even on flat it struggles to accelerate to city driving speeds, and as it does black smoke spews out the tailpipe, dirtying the beautiful New Mexico air.

 

 

Family (Oklahoma)

Loumen lost both of his parents when he was still very young. But a spare set of hands was a valuable thing on a farm, so his neighbors took him in and raised him to work. When the Civil War broke out he left the farm to fight for the North. At the end of the war he marched to Washington DC for the three-day victory parade, and after that he walked back home to marry his sweetheart from the farm. They had a daughter named Juliana, my great grandmother.

Ducalian was from Alabama, but at some point decided to move, with his family and slaves, to Texas. On the journey his wife became ill, and died. Duke told his children and slaves to stay put where they were, and went back home. He married his old neighbour Martha, and off they went to catch up with the others and continue on to Texas. Duke and Martha had 4 children, one of whom was Richard, my great-grandfather.

Clifford, Darrell, Daisy

Richard and Juliana came to Oklahoma because it was the newest state, and land parcels were being given free to those willing to farm them. They had ten children together, including my grandfather Roscoe.

I didn’t know any of this until yesterday, when I arrived in Oklahoma City and met my second cousin Darrell for the first time. He welcomed me into his house with real joy, sat me down, and we started telling each other stories. Today we had lunch with Clifford and Daisy, more second cousins who were equally delighted to meet me, and who gave me Roscoe’s old harmonica. Later I met Sue, who had the shiniest eyes I’ve ever seen, and who gave me the tightest hug. Darrell and I drove out to the land that Roscoe lived on, and we saw the teeny little windblown graveyard where he’s buried right next to his parents, and just a few stones over from Duke and Martha, my great-great-grandparents.

A whole new branch of family and history, it’s a really amazing thing. When we said our goodbyes Darrell told me he loved me, and I said I loved him, and we meant it.

Travelling broke sucks

Woke up in Kentucky. One of my dear friends looooves bourbon, and I would love to be able to bring her some. Another dear friend loves country music and everything Nashville; a few hour later there I am driving right on by Nashville. I go past Memphis too, but I don’t mind not stopping at Graceland, I can’t think of any peeps that would really really love an Elvis souvenir.

I’m using an excel spreadsheet to keep track of my budget for the trip; given the money I have and what I hope to still have by the time I get back to Vancouver, I’ve whittled myself down to a food budget of $10 a day. I also have to be stingy with time; when I get back to BC I’ll need to get a job right away. Each extra day on the road costs more money and delays my capacity for bringing in new money.

But this should be an adventure, not a task. I’m making my way across a vast country full of amazing things to see; I can’t just drive by all of it.

Fallingwater

When I was 9 or 10 years old my family went to New York, and at the MOMA we saw a model of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater. I was amazed at the idea of a stream incorporated into a house, and at what a beautiful thing it was. It was the first I’d ever heard that you could design such things for a living, and I decided then that I wanted to be an architect. Over the years I shied away from that dream, then approached it again, and repeated the cycle many times. I guess even now, though I’ve made a commitment to pursuing it, I still feel doubt sometimes.

Well the strangest thing happened yesterday, while I was stopped at a gas station in Pennsylvania looking at my road atlas: there in the margin was a little photo of Fallingwater, with a caption saying it was in Mill Run, Pennsylvania. It was practically right in my path. An hour or two down the road, and I was at a starbucks booking my tour for this morning at 11am.  Crazy!

It’s stunning, by the way. The living room feels so expansive that it has its own horizon, yet it brings the woods into the room with you… and somehow it also feels cozy and protective. Some people say FLW made ceilings low at entrances to make us uncomfortable and propel us into the rooms beyond, but maybe it’s just tall people who say that. I found the ceiling heights everywhere to be juuuuust right.