Good-bye Shackles / A Tip on how to be a Full Time RV'er

Tim Eagle here, author of my best-selling short story, One Last Breath. I’m bringing fiction, travel and a freeing tip today. My mind is a little buzzed, on coffee and toast, but just the same, I need to write! I’m happy to say that I’m a full time RV Person (Dark Nest Travels YouTube). Today, I am going to give you a tip on how to make your life as free as mine.

I have been full timing, living on the road in the "Mothership", a 2005 Newmar Class A for two and a half years (more next time on what the F*** is a Class A?). A ton has been learned since the beginning of our journey, and I’m often faced with the question, “How did you get started?”

My Cliffs Notes version: Every day of my hum drum life, day in and day out, I clocked in to a “nine to five” and viewed the job as a prison sentence. I arrived home, did my fatherly and husband duties, and I fantasized about hooking up our tow trailer, and just touring the states. Every time a camper pulled into the Target parking lot to shop, there was this pain and slight enviousness inside me. I wanted that life. In my head, I was sorting out the finances, and calculating how much I could have by the time our youngest turned eighteen. Day in and day out, I could only think of the future. Dwelling on those lucky travelers I’d see on the road or in that beat up parking lot of my employment. This became an obsession.

Flash forward, and believe me, time flew, FAST, our youngest was graduating from high school. He decided that he did not want to attend college, and instead wanted an apartment, and to join the work force full time. We supported him, helped him move, and then truly began to plan. I navigated exiting my job at Target, albeit half assed, and kind of whimsically pulled out of my ass. I finally, after many years, had our small mortgage of our “Dark Nest” paid off (a one room school house in Sandusky, Michigan), and we were freed. Maria and I made our first purchase of a thirty-foot Airstream Motorhome, which would ease us into the future of the Newmar and full time RV’ing.

The tip I promised: If you want to join the RV lifestyle, get yourself out of debt, and plan to consolidate EVERYTHING in your life. Free yourself, if you have not looked at the material item laying around the house, collecting dust, in say, a month, the object is useless. Start easy, start with your clothes, and move into the knick-knacks, the furniture, and everything you are not sentimentally attached to. Plan on how long you want to take before you make the decision to sell the house and search for an RV. It took Maria and I several stages, but in about two summers we finalized the details, i.e. distributing, donating and/or trashing the belongings we no longer used or had use for, finalize the projects on the house and then put it up for sale. When you do this, you will get free from those shackles of consumerism, and then realize the process of minimizing is not as bad as you thought it would be. Good luck. Next time, I break down the different types of RV's, and choosing what best suites your needs for life on the road.

Thanks for reading.

Tim Eagle

Tim Eagle is an author of the novellas Stolen Seed, Life Ship, and the Vasectomus Collection. He lives full time, on the road, with his wife, Maria and their dog, Cocoa. He grew up in Michigan and is inspired by the dysfunction of America. His books are available on Amazon, godless and this site timeaglefiction.com Thanks for reading!