FAQ's

In the 7 months of planning …and not planning, and procrastinating, and assembling, and researching, and talking with friends, neighbors, relatives, friends and neighbors of relatives, and people we have met in the grocery store check out line…the three questions that people pose to me (note: not Evan) the most are:

1. How many pairs of shoes do you bring in the RV?

2. How are you going to keep from going nuts in the RV?

3. How do you have sex in the RV?


I shall address these in order of importance.

1. How many pairs of shoes do you bring in the RV?

While I have never thought of myself as a materialistic fashion hound (today’s outfit is a 3 year old wrap around dress from Target, a pair of 4 year old Cole Hahn black flip flop sandals, cubic zirconium earrings bought for 20 quid at the school auction, and a silver Tiffanies heart necklace that was a gift from Evan’s last company’s boondoggle) I have a weakness for shoes. Not that I spend much money on each pair of shoes. I am more of a variety and style gal rather than a name brand type.

I blame it on Southwest Junior High School in Minneapolis. 1974. 7th grade. Adidas. I had to have a pair. Anybody who was anybody wore Adidas. If you had money to burn, you had the green striped. Middle of the road, you went for the blue. Strapped for cash meant you had the red. The red ones were 26 dollars at the Footlocker at Southdale Shopping Mall in Edina.

I made 50 cents an hour babysitting. I needed the last 5 bucks to get me over the top so I could buy that red pair of entry level Adidas. New Years Eve was coming up, excellent babysitting potential.

December 31st found me on the couch of the Andersons watching over their 3 kids all under the age of 5. I was 12 years old. I was responsible. My mother was a nurse and she would be home and we lived down the street. I was their gal and they needed me from 6 PM until 3 AM. Score. Got the kids to bed by 7:30, and I settled in with a bowl of ice cream in front of the TV to watch Invasion of the Body Snatchers with the fabulous feeling that I would go home with enough money to put me over the edge so I could afford my red Adidas.

Who cared if it snowed 2 feet the day before school started up again in January. I wore my Adidas through the snow drifts in the bitter cold knowing that my position in the pecking order would be established through my shoes.

Today I dream about my box of shoes in the storage facility in Framingham, Massachusetts. My aubergine boots I bought at La Samaritaine in Paris with my sister in law Bonnie, my black lace up low heeled boots from Rome, the 9 West purple pumps with the fake jewel.

Here is what made it into the black milk crate under the couch in the RV (where the entire family stores its shoes). 1. Aforementioned black Cole Hahn sandals; 2. similar brown Timberland flip flops; 3. rubber-soled really comfortable waterproof Keens: and 4. UK blue running/hiking shoes. I will be adding a pair of brown boots once it gets colder, if the budget allows.

2. How are you going to keep from going nuts in the RV?

Party line: It helps that we all like our own time reading, writing, hiking. While yes, this is an intense amount of family time, we also are trying to respect each others time as individuals.

The truth: We drive each other nuts. Simon is the only one that is consistently in fine form. Josh the pre-adolescent and me the peri menopausal are at odds every other day for a bit. Evan and I are both alpha control types and in our life prior to the RV he had his fiefdom and I had mine. We respect each others strengths and try to complement each others where we can. After almost 14 years of marriage and 16 years together this has worked relatively well.

And then there was yesterday…

We are staying at my cousin’s house for a few nights in the Dogtown section of St. Louis just south of Forest Park. Fabulous location. We can walk to the zoo and the free museums in the park. All is well. The RV is parked out front. We are hoping not to drive it for a few days – stupid to drive it around the city. Evan and I leave the boys in charge of each other while we ride our bicycles to Schnucks Grocery Store. Adorable. We are like college age coed’s with our back packs on and we head out on this 95 degree day in 97% humidity. It is less than a mile. I know the way to go. Evan googlemaps it and finds a better way to go on secondary roads. Fine. Oops, construction. Road is closed. Back to original way. Nope, Evan needs to make his own, new, way. I know where I am. I know where we need to go. But he has his Blackberry with the map. I have my eyes and my sense of direction!

We both got there and we both got home. Albeit we got home our separate but equal ways. We both have trouble following. But we both trust and respect each other enough and have faith in each others abilities to get to the same place – sometimes by different routes.

3. How do you have sex in the RV?

Nope. Enough said. Can’t go there. And please no more jokes about the bumper sticker: If it’s rockin, don’t bother knockin’.