!Empower!

Junior the RV
It first was a hot and cold relationship with us and Junior, seeing as he got some many people to come up to the RV and chat with us about what were doing. We've met Sonny and Nico in the middle of the night in a west texas gas station, 2 musicians moving from Cali to Atlanta, who just happened to sing at my sis' 18th bday/cotillion. We met Mikey/DJ Jester, Krista, performers who in the very essence of what they do share themselves, their flavor, and soul, and it's apparent in all of their music. We met a couple in Las Vegas who have been travelling for the past 6 years with a small mobil home, A activist fighting for LGBT suicide awareness, interested motorists, a freelance Sony camera salesman, and more good hearted folks who believe in defining your won road in life.

Buuuuuut, Junior has now cost us two going on three events now, and has been broken on 12 days of our 22 days on the road. Driving out of Dallas a couple days ago, we drove through Oklahoma and Kansas and got hit in the middle of a snowstorm, so we stopped in Overlan Park, KS, and camped out for the night, with a plan to wake up at 6:30 the next morn and start the drive to Madison for our event at U of Wisconsin. We got Junior started and were turning in the parking lot, when Junior went kaput. Just died. We spent the next two hours tinkering with him, adding antifreeze, oil, checking his levels, and consulting with friendly locals giving advice.

As 9:30 rolled around, Junior had to be moved, with Wholefoods about to have a busy busy day for the shoppers who had been snowed in from the previous days. So we starting pushing Junior in the icy parking lot, or at least we were trying to, when a family with two young sons, and a man who had just parked, came to our aid, and helped us roll Junior to another section of the parking lot. Even though we get troubles like this on the road, we are in turn blessed to see the humanity in a lot of people, their willingness to help out someone just because they need it.

We waited for half the day as someone suggested that Junior might have had his diesel gel up in the cold so we bought an additive that was suppose to help the fuel fight that, but it was becoming apparent that we had again missed on what was possibly wrong with Junior. So we called the emergency roadside assistance and they suggested that we have Junior towed, but that they wouldn't able to do it til today at 9am, we had no choice.

Now without Junior starting, we had no power for anything, no water, no internet, everything shifted, it seemed like with no destination to be able to go to, and no connection to our friends and fam, that we were floating vagabonds in isolation with no purpose but to kill time til we could get Junior fixed. So we went back to Wholefoods(for the 5th time), now known as the kids in the RV who broke down, the girls washed their hair, we charged up all our computers, cell phones, and used the internet before we'd have to go back into Junior for the dark powerless night.

And here we are today, back at Whole Foods(for the 6th time), as Junior was towed away, and we got more crushing news that he might not even be looked at until tomorrow, so now were vagabonds without a place to sleep at the moment, and waiting to see how this all plays out. It's been definitely a humbling experience, and it makes me see life from another aspect, and how a lot of the basics in life I take for granted, and I gotsta more thankful for those and not look at them with such a sense of entitlement, so this is definitely a neccessary and important experience right now, but hopefully we'll be able to hit the road soon, and do that work with students and regain that purpose!