Sooooo, my van project. A big reason for the blog, I mean you know this wasn’t just to share my insanity right. We have an idea of how we want things to go, then we start to see them morph into something that wasn’t intended and it makes me think they become what they’re supposed to be and not what I intended them to be. I wasn’t born to use drugs, commit crimes and end up in Narcotics Anonymous, but that’s exactly how it went and it couldn’t have happened any better. Well besides all the civilians I hurt along the way and for that I am sorry, yet I’ve served my penance and no longer feel the shame and guilt that helped propel me deeper into the grips of my addiction. See, becoming something other than what was intended. Anyways..
A couple weekends back I installed the solar panels, well I didn’t, I had my helpers doing it. My stepdad Michael and his buddy John, both old as hell and slower than a snail on peanut butter. My instant gratification wants to see progress, you know the self centered part of our existence, what ‘I want.’ The results came in at the end of the day and still the panels were only installed but not hooked up. It came out clean though, we placed them at the front of the van running long ways side to side. I think in retrospect I would have drilled the holes for the lines to the charger into the roof of the van in the middle of the van and not off to the side. You can see the lines and it looks a little ghetto. But being that this is my first build and I have always been a fair bit ghetto, it works. We have 2 150 watt Renergy panels up there, they are feeding the 12 volt, 200 amp hour, AGM battery. We went with this battery and not 2 6 volts due to pricing. I think I paid $480 for the battery and the 2 6 volt one’s woulda cost closer to $600? Less wires, same results. I think being the AGM – gel based, no venting needed battery is what really drove up the cost. I paid $450? for the solar set up, I think. A lot of the blogs we read used the Renergy set up so in true form of forging our own path we did the same. I we the word ‘we’ cause really this just isn’t me doing this, I’m pretty much following the old mans lead.
So yeah, panels went in on Saturday and the following Sunday I went to the parent’s house to paint their kitchen and that’s when Michael connected the panels to the battery and wired in the invertor. It was good to have that done, but it didn’t feel hella accomplishing for some reason. It was like, cool, there’s power to the battery but nothing to use the power on. I thought I would have been much more excited about the results. Anyways, grateful I was to see those 4 gage red wires running from the battery to the invertor. There’s something about seeing those red wires run throughout the electrical system that feels good.
This last weekend we cut a hole in the roof and installed the MaxxAir fan. Skeptical as I was to actually cut a hole in the roof and get it water tight but we did it. I actually went by a new shop here in town that builds Sprinters and asked them what they would charge to put in the fan and the soon to go in window, I was quoted $800.. Fuck that guy, shoulda just said he didn’t want to do it. Like it took all of 2 hours at best from start to finish with wiring it and we had never installed one and I’m sure the window is going to be just as easy. $800, what a punk… So yeah the fan is in and once it started spinning, that’s when I could feel something, hearing the buzz of the motor made it all more real. Blowing air in, sucking air out, the van started to come alive. Although I think the fan is a little cheap, it was the mid-range one, the plastic seems flimsy but whatever, again, all the blogs rave about it. So now I have a fan (not the kind that cheers my name, which woulda been way more awesome) all the insulation complete, all the wires ran except for 2 and I’m about to order the fridge. It has been a slow process.
I keep trying to remind myself that it is not a race and a real Buddhist would be in the moment, experiencing everything as it happened. Noticing all that sprouted, grew and died. I guess that’s why I’m a part-time Buddhist. This build is really all I have going on in my life. I mean I have friends and meetings and a business and a daughter and yoga school and la la la, but this is like the focus, this is what I am basing my life around, my possible future around. If I was in love it would be her that received most my energy, if I was money hungry it would be my business that received most my time, if I owned a home all my efforts would be into remolding it. I think I accepted the choice of this van build, ran with this idea, this dream cause I needed purpose in my life. After the divorce 6 ½ years ago everything changed and my life lost most its purpose. I slept around, took some trips, fell in love but the void couldn’t be filled. It wasn’t until I got deeper into my Buddhist practice that I started to find some fulfillment. But still an emptiness has lingered. Hence the van, the life style change.
I mean I got to live an amazing life so far. I had a beautiful wife, I got to raise an even more beautiful daughter, a thriving business. I’ve been able to help countless addicts, through sponsorship and giving them jobs when some were completely unemployable. I’ve been able to donate thousands of dollars over the last 15 years to charities, give loans that will never be paid back (I don’t do that anymore btw so don’t come look’n ;) without a resentment, be kind, loving and compassionate. For years now I have been able to lay my head to rest every night with no shame or guilt and now to think that I got to do all this and I could quite possibly have the opportunity to live one last dream, to travel around the country with no destination or plan or timeline. All because I stayed clean, because I chose not to pick up one day at a time for over 18 years. I think I shoulda done this when I was 20someting or 30 something, I think to myself I’m too old for this now. But reality is I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to raise my daughter and help all those people. My life woulda been so much more empty if not for all the beautiful people I’ve been blessed to know.
A fan did all this, got me thinking and feeling all this. Can you imagine what it’s going to be like when I get the interior walls get installed and it starts to look more like a home. I guess I could grind harder and longer at work and retire like this, leave at 60 and travel but there is no guarantee that I will live that long and I already kinda suck at mountain biking so can only guess how bad I will be at 60! Holy baby Jesus. I couldn’t be more grateful in this very moment… Today my employee said he might have to hand in his 2 week notice, dating is... ummm, that’s a whole ‘nother subject, my P&L for the first quarter showed a $1851 profit for my business, I have yet another cold, one of my closest and I are on the rocks and I couldn’t be more grateful for what I have had in my life. Not what I do or don’t have now, not what could happen in the future or the pains of my prior existence, I’m grateful that I got to live an amazing life so far. I got to be something for someone else and for that I am so grateful.
If your wondering what the progress is looking like in the van you can follow it on Instagram or Youtube, the link is on the home page!
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