It feels like time to move on. I have a need for dirt cheap housing. Which means time to live in a hole or floating on a stream or marchland. perhaps I can invent a combination of both. I also NEED books, so I cannot stray overly far from a library. If I am to be a floating citizen, I will need another boat to act as my tender. If a hole dweller I will need a bike or land vehicle. and if both perhaps both.
So within the first month I should find either land or make a raft of sorts. I land, I dig a ditch and shelter it, If a raft a mooring site.
Whatever shelter, I should get a solar charger, a battery and an inverter to run lights, phone chargers, simple tools. A heater of sorts to cook and warm the air when necessary.
A raft on water needs two sheet of plywood at least 5/8 of an inch thick, connected by some type of wood, probably 2x6's to make an 8x8 foot platform. Nail onion sacks from your local grocer's to the bottom and fill these with capped empty soda bottles. The more bottles the more flotation. Form a shelter from the rain with any type of tarp, plastic or thatch cover. Done with a cost under $50 USD.
In the ground, house. Starting with two parallel ditches about 8 to 10 feet apart. Stretch plastic sheeting between and into the ditches. Refill the ditches to securely hold and tighten the sheeting. Then start digging between the filled ditches to establish a narrow home as deep and I desire.
Use either of these as a shelter while a more permanent structure is built.
On land--- set 2x4's on the outside edges of the two filled ditches. Drive nails or spikes or rebar through these to anchor them to the ground, making sills flat on the ground. Staple the narrow ends of cattle panel welded wire to the inside edge of one of the 2x4 sills. Repeat until as many panels as I desire have been laid out. Starting with the center panel attach a rope to the unstapled end and throw the rope across the already stretched plastic to the other side of the temporary narrow shelter. Pull the rope tight bringing the cattle panel up and then across to the other side. staple its narrow edge to the 2x4 sill. Repeat until all panels have been formed into hoops stapled to the sills.
Now, I will take the plastic sheeting and stapling one edge to the outside of a 2x4 sill stretch it up and over the hoops and staple it to the other sill on its outside edge. Excess plastic can be reburied to let any rain water drain away from the shelter. Expand the original hole, reinforce the walls with wattle and daub, post set into the ground and backed by wooden boards, or bricks. No matter the wall method chosen protect the wall from earth moisture with plastic. Hurrah an infinitely expandable house. Use wood, adobe or plastic to make doors.
Why I am in New Mexico? My friend, Kim, who has never been overly fond of anyone but herself, suffered some physical breakdowns as a result of a new as yet undiagnosed tumor. She needed help caring for her house and dogs, so I began bringing some of my houseboat stuff to her house to store, and helped her get to the Veteran's hospital in Roanoke, VA. She was treated for a blocked bowel and a growth was removed. The staff helped her pass an additional 20 pounds of compacted fecal matter, so she was hospitalized four days. I brought her home and continued helping her as she rested.
I drove Kim to North Carolina and brought a woman who had previously been physically abused to Kim's house with us. I didn't know that Kim has assaulted her previously. It became apparent that she had been lying to the girl over the phone and internet about having successfully taken an anger management program at the VA hospital and being on some calming medications.
The first day back at Kim's rented house, she verbally abused the woman. The second day, Kim felt well enough to return to work. When she came home, Kim threatened and then struck this very passive woman. When I stood between Kim and the woman, Kim walked away but returned with a machete. I would not move aside, so Kim began shouting that I was breaking them up. She accused me of breaking her and her ex-girlfriend, Laurie apart. She then thrust the knife at me. I told her not to do that again. When she turned away, I went to gather my things, because I did not want to stay in that house.
Kim hit the woman again and I put my body between them again. Kim got her knife and swinging it demanded that the woman come outside with her. I followed them outside.
Kim swung the knife at me and I went down the porch steps into the yard. I called 911 on my cellphone and asked for the police.
Kim used the knife to threaten the woman, but did not strike her again. About a 1/2 hour later a police officer came and took the knife from Kim. I waited in the yard while she spoke to the two women.
Additional officers arrived and I was told that I must leave Kim's house. The abused woman had told the officers that I had started the ruckus.
The officers remained on scene as I packed and watched as Pastor Stephen from the Wytheville Lutheran Church arrived. He helped me load about 2/3rds of my things in his small car. I left behind many things, knowing I would not be allowed to retrieve them.
Pastor Steve drove me into Wytheville and contacted the domestic violence folks for me. They put me up in a motel room for four nights while I looked for an apartment to live in.
The abused woman called my cell the first morning and said that Kim had broken her teeth out in the afternoon after I left. Kim had also smashed her phone by throwing it from an Interstate overpass. I told her to hang up and to call 911 even though her phone screen was shattered and it wasn't working well. The police would come.
They did come and she was able to get her things and leave with their help. I called the Veterans and told them that Kim was behaving irrationally. They did not seem too concerned. The abused girl called me and said the police had gotten her back to North Carolina.
At the end of the four nights I had discovered that no apartments or affordable housing would be available in Wytheville for two months. I called my friend, Beth and asked to store what I could not carry on my back and in a rolling suitcase at her house. I then got a ride to the bus station in Max Meadows from the domestic violence counselor. I thanked her. The station attendant charged me a great deal to put the rolling suitcase on the bus and I started toward Denver, Colorado by way of Chicago, IL. Strange routing.
The bus trip was unpleasant, because the medication I took to cure my kidney infection was causing me repeated and persistent diarrhea. I could not sit for even an hour without having to walk to the back of the bus to void. On the fourth day of my bus ride, I arrived in Cheyenne and hitch-hiked to Rock Springs, Wyoming. There I stayed with my friend, Donna. We took a ride through Pinedale, a place where I had once been the pastor. The town has grown considerably. Then we went to Jackson for a brief lunch and onward toward Dubois, Wyoming. We were stalled by a semi-truck sliding across the roadway on it side. We had a wonderful few hours watching the snow fall blanketing the trees. When the road reopened we continued to Dubois.
As I unloaded my things at my daughter's house, she came home to tell me that I could not stay because her husband had decided that trans people like me were not part of their family. I hugged Donna and she started the drive to Lander on her way back to Pinedale. She had driven with me two hundred and fifty miles to let me visit with my daughter, Liz. Now she would drive 250 miles back to her home while I stayed in Dubois. As she drove out of sight, my daughter gave me the news that I was not welcome in her home, but I was welcome to her.
Lis, my not quite two year-old granddaughter, Jordan and I ate dinner at a restaurant. Lis then drove me out to spend a half hour with my son, Joshua. He looked worn down. He chews tobacco now and his wife, Haley was not home. She was working, tending bar in town. Lis gave me a ride to a motel where I spent the night.
In the morning, she brought Jordan by to say goodbye. I hitched a ride out of town. One of the two ladies who gave me my first ride of the day, worked as an aide in my daughter's school. She had broken her hip and was going to New Mexico with her sister to recover. She told me my son-in-law, Jared was not very friendly and she could understand why he would shun me. They also told me that they had worried about picking me up, but they had a brother/sister, who had just begun transitioning. They gave me a ride one hundred plus miles to Lander, Wyoming. I lost my phone on my next ride, it probably slipped out of my bag as I got out of that car. A farmer from Farson took me to Eden and an oilfield hand gave me a ride to Rock Springs.
I found a payphone and called Donna, who let me stay two more days at her house. She made me a little cake for my birthday.
Thanks Daddy.
