Move in Day (Night)

When it was time for me to bring my new home to its new home, my future in-laws, Ross, and I headed to their cabin property in east Texas to hook that bad boy up and roll it back north to Shady Grove. As I said before, I had never set foot in a RV. My family vacations typically revolved around hotel pools and cute antique shops, not rolling cross country in a house on wheels. I was pretty excited to check out my new "efficiency apartment." Anyone who has ever lived on or visited a farm knows that there is always work to be done, so before I could scope out my new digs, we had to do some work around the property. All day Saturday, the Wunders and I cleared fallen limbs, mowed the grass, mended fences, etc, so it wasn't until Sunday, the day we were leaving with the trailer that I actually got to go inside it.

First impression: small. Second impression: totally do-able. I do like adventure after all, and living in this small quasi-house, I was sure would make me an even stronger person... or at least give me some stories to tell. In the very least, I knew it would be an experience. While I started cleaning up my new place (it had been sitting, parked under an awning for months), the Wunders were still doing some maintenance around the cabin. With just me in the space, it seemed nicely sized. I got it all spick and span and free of mice nests in the oven (like I said, it was sitting in the country for months. All sanitized now though. We're good.), and I surveyed where I'd be living for the better part of a year.

When you first step into the RV, you're in the foyer. There is a closet to the left and the kitchen counter to your right. Take a step forward, and you're in the living room. There is a couch on the left that turns into a bed (for all the guests I can supposedly fit in it), and to the right is a "hallway" to the kitchen and dining area. Passed the kitchen is the bathroom, and passed the bathroom is the bedroom. I have a diner style booth, an oven, a microwave, a fridge and freezer combo, a shower and bath tub, and a full sized bed. All the things a girl needs. Even without the necessary closet space and dish washer, it's a pretty nice place. Interesting color scheme throughout, but hey, just because the leaf-patterned wallpaper and blue carpet doesn't particularly reflect my personality, it doesn't mean that I can't make it my own. I was feeling pretty good about my new home.

Because of all the work we still had to do around the cabin, it was very late when we left with the RV in-tow. Very late. Past midnight late. The cabin is about 2 hours from Shady Grove, so by the time we get there, it's obviously dark, in the middle of "mandatory quiet time," and we're all exhausted. When we find my RV parking spot, or my new address, Ross tries to direct his dad, Bob, into the space. The RV spaces are very close together, and the spaces aren't very big. Like I said, it's dark, it's late, we're tired. Bob and Ross try, and try, and try, to back the RV into the spot without going over into the surrounding grass, hitting the small trees that are planted there, and get the outlets on the trailer close enough to the lighthouse looking box that we need to hook it into to have electricity. Bob would start to back up, Ross would tell him to correct it somehow, Bob would over-correct or under-correct or not even see or hear Ross, and then pull forward and start all over again. And over and over again. It would've been comical had there not been a lot of cursing. Actually, it was still comical to my future mother-in-law, Fran, and I. It looked something like this:

Finally, we (meaning Bob and Ross, I was merely a bystander) got the RV in the space and hooked up to electricity. However, the furnace on the RV was broken. That means, that there was no heat in the RV. It was December. We also didn't have the right water hoses to have running water. Without the furnace, we also couldn't have hot water. None of that really worked for me, so it was decided that I would spend the night at the Wunder's and get everything fixed later. We prepare to leave the RV park and Bob tries to show me how to lock the doors to the RV. There are two doors. They are on the same side of the RV, but one goes directly to the bedroom, and it's closer to the front of the RV. The other goes into the foyer area and is at the back. I won't be using the door to the bedroom, so it will stay locked. Both doors have two locks. Each door has its own key that works both locks. One lock on the door actually locks the door and the other lock locks the handle from opening. Don't ask me why this is necessary, and don't ask Bob that either at 3 o'clock in the morning. It's not a good idea. Anyway, we're all so ready to leave. So Bob shows me how to lock the bedroom door's two locks with its key. Always lock the locking lock first, then try the handle to make sure the lock locked, then lock the handle lock. Super simple. My turn. We go to the main door, and Bob tries to show me how to lock it. The key breaks off in the door! I can't help it; I burst out laughing so hard that my neighbors (6 feet away) probably heard me. Bob gives a big sigh and rolls his head back and stomps off muttering a lot of four-letter words. Luckily, Ross gets the broken key out of the door, and we are able to lock the locking lock and the handle lock with the spare key. All locked up, exasperated, and still giggling (some of us, anyway), we pile into our cars and head home with Bob vowing that everything will be alright. He will fix the furnace, hook up my water, and get me new (stronger?) keys for my new home before I returned from my trip to visit my parents over Christmas.

After that night, I knew RV living was going to be very interesting indeed. I just didn't know how much could go wrong. I would find out soon enough though, and so will you!

May your keys never break, but if they do, may you be able to laugh about it,

Ray