This morning, with a measure of sadness and anxiety, I placed my home of the last six months in a storage lot for the winter. Our eight-foot Lance camper has been a better home than we dared hope. Yes, we’ve had to replace the water heater and contend with a number of irritating mechanical problems, but as a couple we’ve been largely happy to call this small container our home. It’s beauty, however, depends largely on our ability to move it around, which includes the ability to avoid extended periods of low temperatures. Fort Collins winters at 5,500 feet were too hard in our 33-foot fifth wheel – a winter at 7,000 feet in the camper might be really unpleasant. When our friend and associate Peter offered us a cheap room in his house south of Santa Fe, we took it.

It’s been over three years since I lived in a house. Much of it seems luxurious, but aspects of it will take some getting used to. The feeling that our possessions are now spread over more spaces and not movable at a moment’s notice makes me uneasy. Having separate spaces to cook, eat, sleep, and work is nice, but I’m not good at it any more. I wander from room to room, prone to forgetting what I was doing. There’s something to be said for having everything you own at arm’s reach. More space also means more cleaning up, something I was never good at. I also feel like my environmental footprint is expanding with my living space, even though I have no solid evidence of it.

Ann has a great job, well worth a winter in a nice house in Santa Fe. I’ll have a bit more reliable contract work, telecommuting a few hours a week to a job for Continuing Education at Colorado State University. I’m determined to keep the outdoors large in my life, and to share my insights and inspirations in Outdoorism. If all goes well, we’ll be under the Wyoming sky for two months next summer…