If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. ~Anne Bradstreet, American poet

Monday, February 5, 2024.

I hope that this finds you well and content, wherever you are, and that your winter is moving quickly along. We’re doing our best to hang in there and maintain a positive attitude…but cold, wet and gray gets old after a while. Thank God the sun has shone and the temperatures have been as high as the lower 60’s a few days this week. It gives me hope that spring is just around the corner.

In mid-January we had some super-low temperatures at night, which neither we–nor our rig–have seen for a few years, and we were all out of practice when it came to dealing with it. Keeping Felix’s plumbing, both intake and outgo, from freezing up was challenging enough, but one failure after another kept happening. In just a matter of days, the grey water and black water valves froze up…the black water tank got clogged…the drain hose froze, twice…the electric coil for the hot water tank burned out…the toilet had to be replaced…the stereo quit working (the one quick fix! just a fuse)…one of the supports to the basement doors broke…and just recently the outlet for the washer quit working, necessitating the need for that to be replaced.

So often we muse, “if this lifestyle was easy, everybody’d be doing it,” mainly because of the concessions one has to make to live in a very small space. But after all those failures, even I was beginning to wonder if this lifestyle was worth it. At any rate, Felix is going to need some TLC when we get back to Arkansas. Not only are 97% of Dave’s tools there, but so is Brian, our trusted RV mechanic, who’s going to do the things Dave can’t. While he’s a terrific handiman and can fix just about anything, a knee that can’t be bent definitely limits what he can and cannot do.

The weather has kept us indoors for the most part, but it’s not like we don’t try to be active. The local bowling alley has a daily special from noon until 5 p.m., “Bowl Your Brains Out,” when you can bowl as many games as you want for $11, and we do love to bowl. We even travel with our bowling balls, which our granddaughter finds hilarious. “Mimi,” she’ll lament, “you’re always SO concerned about storage and weight in the RV, and here you carry around your bowling balls!” It’s true. I am a minimalist in just about everything, but I do have my priorities. A lesson was learned, though, when Dave unpacked his bowling ball and discovered something else the cold temps could do…

The main reason we’re here this winter is to help our daughter, Kate, who’s got her hands full with raising two teenagers, running a business and maintaining a home. I remember being her age and having the realization that it was actually during the teenage years that kids needed their parent’s attention and love the most. Especially these days, when there are bad influences everywhere. So, we are here to assist-as-needed…mostly shuttling Maeby to where she needs to be so that Kate can work–whether that’s from school to home, or to a friend’s house, or to volleyball lessons or where she volunteers or wherever–and helping Kate when asked.

I’m glad we made the decision to spend the winter here in Kentucky instead of going to Rockport, Texas, where we’d already made reservations. It’s nice to be wanted, needed, and appreciated! Nine local restaurants serve beer from Hopkinsville Brewing Company, and delivering it is just something else she’s got to do. Just the other day she asked me to go with her to deliver beer to a restaurant in Madisonville, and it was a lot of fun just being with her while she was out doing her thing. One day in January, she needed someone to mind the brewery while she made deliveries, so Dave volunteered…which meant he got to hang out at HBC and pour beer for customers for a couple of hours. The best part was that he had a whole new audience for his quips! He had a great time, I suggested he ask Kate to put him on the schedule just to give him something to do, but that was before things started going south in the RV.

Spring can’t come soon enough! Living with another person in a somewhat small and confined space is challenging enough, but when weather or temperatures force the situation for days that turn into more than a week, it becomes even more serious. Especially when it seems like everything is going wrong all at once. So I needed to find something to do to be occupied while Dave was fixing things…,

Even though we’ve been cooped up inside for the most part this winter, I find it easy to stay busy. What I don’t do is sit and watch television (for more than 3 years now) nor stay online for any length of time. I’ve become a hermit, kind of. I love to learn, though, and recently I learned how to do something new in knitting. I’ve been doing a lot of it, however, I don’t have much to show because I keep making mistakes and have to start all over. It’s SO frustrating, but I love it and I keep starting over. It’s a challenge; and plus, I’m stubborn. At any rate, it keeps me purposefully busy, which is all a person with ADHD ever wants. Up until now, I’ve only knitted scarves, so this is the biggest project I’ve attempted. With luck, it will grow up to be a shawl someday.

Another thing that been occupying me this winter is reading, and I’ve been amazingly diligent about a daily read-the-Bible-in-a-year plan that I started back in September. I’ve NEVER been interested in reading the Bible–but what can I say? God works in mysterious ways. Every day, I follow along while listening to it being wonderfully narrated by Max McLean, an American actor most noted for his stage adaptations of books by author C. S. Lewis. I never, ever, would have thought that I’d read the Bible, but I must admit that now it’s the first thing I read every morning, it’s that good. Because it’s true, I find myself going down rabbit holes to find out more about why certain things happened and the people involved. It’s an interesting journey, for sure.

Our short term plan is beginning to fall into place. We’re hoping to travel back to Arkansas in mid-March (which is only 6 weeks away!) and enjoy our spot there on the lake for a little while. Felix is already scheduled for some TLC, and in a way, we are too, as we have doctors appointments to take care of. Sometime around the the eclipse, April 8th, we hope to be heading back here for baseball games and Bobby’s high school graduation.

But as we continue to find on a daily basis, things change. So we are learning how to be flexible and go with the flow. Seems to be a good way to be these days. Until next time…peace, love & smiles! ~Maria