A picture of the bus I’m looking at.
Bus or Bust, I’m all in now.
For those in the know I have been wanting to buy an old school bus for a while so that I can convert it into an RV to live in full time. At the beginning of this year, on my 27th birthday, I moved out of my parent’s home. I love them, but I cannot stand being around them. It hurts me too much, and every suggestion that they change is met with a fight. That plus the fact that I couldn’t afford the rent they were charging led me to walk out the door on the morning of my 27th birthday with my dog Piper and all my belongings that could fit in my car.
I have been so fortunate to have amazing friends and community in Los Angeles that believe in mutual aid praxis. I have been repeatedly stunned by the kindness that these people who I have known for less than a year are willing to offer me, despite all of the things already going on in their lives. I have gotten so much out of this time of dependency. To feel the caring of this supportive community has been truly life changing, but I can’t couch surf forever.
At this time in my life, the idea of a mobile home feels both exciting and vital to my survival, so I am doing everything I can to make it happen. It has been hard to find consistent, well-paying work which has made affording the bus a challenge. And it has been a great frustration to watch the attrition of bills cutting into the bus money, especially for the bills that will stop once I get the bus. Incredibly, my community has been pulling through to help me again. I have been able to raise over $1,500 dollars toward my goal. A month ago, I also sold my car to help make this happen.
I’m all in now.
Piper has been staying with my parents since before I sold my car. I have been searching desperately for buses, so that I can be reunited with her. I’ve gotten very close twice. The first time was a bus that was up for auction. I had the winning bid until the last 20 seconds, when I was outbid. In the second case, I found a bus for sale that had some possibly minor issues, and I was in the process of arranging for a mechanic to go check it out when it was bought out from under me.
But now, I am once again optimistic. I have my eyes on a bus that is up for auction until Monday the 2nd of June. I find my heart praying every way that it knows how, reaching out to the universe and begging that I get this bus for a good price. I even have a name picked out already.
I decided a while ago on the name Ophelia for my bus (I admittedly might be getting a little ahead of myself). I’ve always thought Ophelia was a beautiful name and I picked it from one of my favorite plays. I named my car Gertrude so that when I was demanding a lot of her I could cheer “Go Gurt! Go Gurt! Go Gurt!” Some readers will immediately see the connection between the two names.
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Ophelia—Hamlet’s love interest—is the daughter of queen Gertrude. As great of a play that Hamlet is, it was not my inspiration. No, that would be too easy. Instead, I picked the name Ophelia from what is possibly my favorite play: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. In both plays, however, Ophelia meets the same tragic demise, and I’m hoping that the name won’t be a jinx upon my future home. When looking at this bus I am once again optimistic, and I find myself looking over the pictures and thinking “This looks like Ophelia. This looks like the one.”
I’m doing whatever I can to make this happen. I’m trying to find any web design work that I can. I’m also putting out another ask for donations, so if you’ve thought about helping, now is the perfect time. And if you or someone you know needs some web design work, I have capacity in my workload and would love to help you out!
I need to get home to Piper, and to do that I need a home for the two of us.
Whatever it takes, I’m all in.
If you want to donate to my fundraiser, here is the GoFundMe link.
If you want to donate and avoid the 2.5% that GoFundMe takes, reach out to me on instagram and I’ll send you my Venmo info.
