I see there is a few traveling families and I was wondering, how do you do it? I mean do you have to save up for a while and then go or just head out and expect the unexpected? I used to travel and it seemed we were always desperate for money and there are a lot of people out there with the same burdens. I don't think I want to put that on my children right now, them being so young. But I suppose now would be a good as time as any. I used to live in my van and loved the freedom of it but i always felt an uneasyness about it, for safety reasons and such. The people I had been staying with totally screwed me over and I thought they were "family" ya know. I lost everything, inclduing my home my vw bus. So I tried it for another year on foot and still things kept going bad for me. So i gave up and came home to my actual family and yeah life sucks here in the state of south dakota but i got my life back. i know live on my own. i have money saved up, a first for me. i have a nice car, by only my means of what "nice" is. and i am going back to college. all good things right? but what's missing? sure the material comforts are nice after losing it all, including my ex to prison. but now i am too afraid to give this up for the time being. i want to move so bad but the feeling is that i am stuck here because i have gained my life back. i have the perfect job for the time being working at a food co-op and livng really close, about 3 block radius of my child's daycare, school and my job. what else could I ask for? if i were to go anywhere else, it would be such a struggle to get it like this. should i just count my blessings? or should i move on from this material world and travel or move to better place where people like me, so called "hippy"s are more accepted? (i cannot get a job anywhere else because I have dreads, i have filled out 30 apps and no luck but at the co-op)
follow your heart, do what feels right, i just found out my friend, (also an ex lover) nearly died last year and i only just found out, life is too short, be brave, you can do it, do your reasearch first and then go, ive been so scared to do exactly that but i took the first step on thursday and arranged to visit a 'commune in a house', just to get a feel for things you know! you can do it!
you should ask busmama in the rainbow forums how they do it - they've got 3 kids in a bus & travel everywhere, she homeschools - they have a website too. http://thebusfamily.tripod.com/ we're thinking out the family travelin plan - personally i want a plan before we go. bein on the road broke ain't no fun, and i just can't imagine my kids going without so we are definitely gonna plan this right, do some vending and have a home base before we start out. it might take a while to get it all set up first, i figure at least a year from now before we can take a trip.
I consider myself lucky. My husband works in the medical field and he is planning on taking a traveling job. What this means is that we get to live in different places for 3 months at a time while our rent and traveling expenses are getting paid. Sure we may not be completely free of work but getting to live comfortably and not have to pay rent sure seems nice. Plus, we want to start a family and I don't want to have to work for at least the first year of my child's life and this way I won't have to. Where we live now, we can barely make it on a 2 income salary.
I actually know how most people do it. They spread the Jesus vibe all around and take hand outs from churches. Most rainbows do the same because you can get a gas voucher to the next town with most churches. I am down with Jesus Christ but I consider myself agnostic. I go to a lutheran college and it has been a challenge because i don't like to close my mind off to other religions nor do I want to only think about religion, too fanatical for my taste. but that's not what i am trying to get at here because it can be touchy subject, religion. But I used to do the whole spange and take hand outs from church thing. And it worked for awhile but then I realized that there are more people out there deserving of such aide, like disabled and such, and being so capable of doing so much, I just felt too guilty. I wanted to serve people and now I am getting an education so I can do that. i am going to be a nurse and since one of you mentioned working in the medical field and traveling, that's what i will probably have to do. i want to eventually work with drug addicts trying to get off drugs or be a midwife. i am also a psyche minor. so you are right, i will just have to wait until my studies are complete and then take off. thanks everyone
sounds like you are going to have an awesome life, a real contributor and not a taker. kudos to you! take your time with your education now while you can, cuz sometimes life interferes and won't let you get back to it. don't think of yourself as 'stuck' - this is just another step in your dance of life.
you know i never did get a gas voucher, or spare change, or try any scams or lies. i just stayed honest and let god feed me. i played my mandolin everyday on the streats to eat or drink coffee and smoke cigarettes. really if you dont backtrack too much when you drive, and can do without things that cost money, you can really stretch a buck. when im driving i usually have a gasoline fund, that is an aproximation of how much ill need, but i dont like to crisscross much unless im making money somehow. sometimes you can find some honest work, work a week and split with over a hundred bucks, definately wont increase your 401k portfolio, should be enough for food and gas. you also have to drive an efficient car, like the busses or a honda. you have to give up drugs and most forms of drinking. its not too hard to do, but sometimes it seems like it. i been doin it for about 10 years and the only drugs i ever sold was pot i grew myself, so if your used to that type of hippie lifestyle, it might be hard to adjust.
ok wayfaring, but she asked about traveling with kids - do you do that? a traveling troubador, what a great thing. if i had a couch i'd ask you to come stay for a while just to sing us some songs
ok kids, you need a car seat too. i dunno know how that would be too diferent though. maybe hook up with the food stamps and save em up for a couple of months and stock up on baby food. i dunno. kids tend to be happy wherever they are at. yall might need to get a $20 room a couple of times a week so that they can shower. lil hippie kids need to bathe more often than big hippie kids. i dont understand if she's looking to go full on nomad with her life, or if she's looking to live a drug dealers lifestyle without selling drugs. i mean people are different, have different styles. i can do the full on nomad actually alot better than the babylon wage slave, but i spent alot of time thoughout my life teaching myself medicine and eating out of the wild. i have an iron will and am fairly detached from material possesions. you need all those things to go nomadic, im not saying its not possible, its very possible, its easier than a 9-5, but you can make alot of mistakes in babylon and be ok, theres not much room for error as a nomad.
WE rarely take handouts from churchs, we are not exactly Christians so I don't feel right about it. People always ask me how we make it. Our children don't o without anything. We use a combination of work, and miracles. We are working on our bus right now and have been stopped here since Oct. I can't wait to get back out on the road. Things are a little harder with kids. You do need somewhat of a plan. We don't do alot of planning, but just buying the bus was a big dwal. We lived in a tent for 4 mos to save the money. As for paying for the fuel we do sometimes go to churches or police stations for gas vouchers, but really what is $10 really going to help us? sometimes my husband or I am able to find work. If we have $100 we are doing well. I also don't take food stamps, or welfare. My children are leagely homeschooled. I see more people lose thier kids over this. If you have school age childrne you must follow the laws in "your" state. We have a friends address in Ohio where we try to go 2weeks every year and that qualifies it as our permanat address. The main way we really make the funds is, just sitting inour bus talking to strangers who come up, some need to give and some need to take, we try to help everyone with thier needs. I see it as I like to give to people it makes me feel good to help someone. By letting those who feel called in their own heart to give food, money, fuel or a place to park for awhile I am helping them to feel good about themselves. Out there right now their is someone who wants to "do something" they are just waiting for us to pull up in our bus, open the door and let them help us. I guess just traveling with love and an open mind what is most important. I have a sewing machine, I make clothes and do repairs for sometimes, my hubby is a stone mason, he also does brick, block,tile and carpentry work, he has his tools. He even found a brick job at the gathering, lol. We have never paid for a place to park our bus so that helps alot. The most important thing is to remember there are still miracles and no matter how deperate the situation has been, something always works out in the end. BTW I Looooved south dakota!!!! We got the best reception there, people were so kind and helpful! Blessings, busmama
JFK said 'the only thing we have to fear is fear itself' the bible reads 'fear nothing in this world, but fear god' its hard to take that leap, but once you do you see that your fears limit you and get you in more trouble than anything youre afraid of.
thanks bus mama i wasn't referring to your situation and all earlier i just think it would be hard to have kids out on the road and what if one got sick or something. what would you do about medical care? luckily i am going to school to be a nurse and i am also taking classes as an herbalist. i want to be a well rounded health practioner. to me, 100$ is nothing. that is how different we are. i could sell everything i own and take off, but i want to have a some kind of home base ya know. plus, i only pay 35$ a month for rent being on assistance that i had to wait over 2 years to get, and now that i have got it, it's too comfortable to get off of it. but we want to travel and not raise our kids this way. but it seems too late. i don't know. we actually have about 5000$ saved up between the two of us, me and my mate, but we have a stickier situation than you would think. my man's ex and baby's mom would have a shit fit if we took off with their kid, and between me and him we have one of our own on the way. she would call the cops and such. so we are stuck in a sense. i would really like to buy a bus. where did you get yours? i would like to spend a summer, this one perhaps, gutting out an old school bus and making it sustainable. i think that would be wise to do with our 5 gs. then, we could eventually get away from this stuck sense of life for good. with or without his other kid. i don't know though, i like the situation i am in except for the whole tied into babylon thing. i mean i am comfortable, but i have lived differently and know i could do it again.
If my kids got too sick for me to Dr them myself I would take them to a DR, when my dog got sick it went to a vet, what do you think I would do? My son just recently tore a huge hole in his leg, it took 2 months to heal enough for us to leave, so we stayed and my man worked and it was all good. I get so sick of people who "want to be free" as long as they don't have to give anything up. In this world we have to take chances. Personally if you have another womans child with you I don't think you should even be considering leaving. Its not right when Mothers move across country so fathers can't see the kids and its just as bad for you and your man to leav with her child without her consent and approval unless she is in some way a deranged maniac who is a danger to the child. You knew that he had a child and I think that the idea of you guys taking off without the kid is lame, children need both parents if possible. I too remember when $100 was nothing, my man was making $1000 a week, we had health insurance, a nice house, two new cars. I wanted to be free to follow my heart, I am much happier now. I got my bus from a dealer in Ohio, it cost $2000, you can get a nice running bus for that. the conversion about another $1000 getting alot of salvage parts and gifts of others trash. I guess another few hundred into the electrical system wouldn't be so bad, but is it really that bad that the kids have to turn off the TV cause we're out of power?
Bus mama has given you some really good info, but the stepchild thing can be a real issue. You might try going on short road trips and using SD as a home base. We've been mobile hippies for 16 yrs & our son just turned 15. Busses are expensive & like busmama said, a $10 gas voucher ain't getting ya far. We made a living selling jewelry cuz it was compact. Tires cost 150-350, mechanic work runs 60+ an hour. Gas is so expensive now that we're happy that a nice piece of land found us. We're still living in the bus, now busses; 'hippiesteading' !
Hippiestead, I just checked out your gallery in hopes of finding pics of your of your bus and land and I was pleasantly rewarded. Your "hippiestead" looks so beautiful and peaceful. Thank you for sharing those.
When I tried it with my two babies we stocked up on food before we left. I took every type of clothing in their sizes and two sizes up... I purposely overpacked everything and it payed off... we ended up using it all. I took a kiddie pool for baths and laundry (unforetunetly it blew off the van on the highway). I am back now because when we started out we went about it the wrong way(well for me at least). I spanged... I hate spanging sooo much. I always feel (like someone else said) so guilty. I traveled with Zenia (Buttercup) and she would watch my kids for me while I did it or vice versa so they would never be involved in case something happened. Some people like to live like this but for me it was horrible. It seemed like no matter how hard I tried bad things would happen and I couldn't get out of the rut and I didn't like that... I kept feeling like my karma was bad because I asked people for money and no matter how hard I tried to convince myself I needed it I couldn't because I'm perfectly capable of working my own job. I felt selfish for taking and my conscience couldn't take it. I should be the one providing for the childern I gave life to, not strangers. Before I go back out I am saving up, buying some land, stocking up, getting a college degree (in case all fails and I need to get a good job), and establishing homeschooling so we will not be leaving for good until Noah (now one, almost 2) is at least 5. You'll probably see me though here and there on small trips to gatherings. The land is so if my kids ever say to me they want out of this life I can say "ok" and we can park our bus on the land and decide what to do from there. The degree is so no matter what, I have the ability to work a decent job if we need stay somewhere for awhile. I want to build my perfect home over the next 4-5 years. I've been out there and know all I want and need in it. I am also saving for the next 4-5 years... If I can't do it right I won't do it at all... who knows maybe I'll be here for the next 10 years. My childern's safety is worth it though. I'll admit though... the urge to leave is big... I fight tears daily. I miss it alot. I'm in a situation like you though, I have a job, I'll have my own place in a month (its mine but the lease doesn't start until then)... I feel stuck and I should be happy but I'm not. In ways I am but for the most part I feel an emptiness because I cannot do what I love. My kids smiles fill it though and thats what keeps me going. One day if I'm patient I'll have it all (that I've ever wanted) and that also keeps me going.
Thanks to all of you for your responses. Esp. Earthy Mama and Busmama I didn't mean to offend you busmama, of course i know you would take care of your children, I am sorry if I came across rude that day I wrote, but you must understand, in my life, i have been afraid of people taking my kid away from me because it has already happened. my dad, being a cop, and not just any cop, he's second down from chief of police, decided he didn't like my hair, my way of life which includes being vegetarian, organic, and not giving my child antibiotics. well anywho, he chose to take me to court and take my kid away from me. i felt the loss of my child for only two months when i was forced to get "my act together" as they had said. i got a job, even though my dad disapproves of it, at a natural foods co-op and have been working there steadily for 2 years. i got a place and got back into college. he's happy but i feel like i am not really doing it for me sometimes but other times, i know that he just wants what's best for me and my family. i don't hold resentments but this is the 3rd time he has taken "me" to court for some BS, but only one time for my kid, the other 2 were about me "following his rules" when I was under 18. It was very hard but I have come along way. I miss my free life though and hate that my kids are so dependant on things like TV and their "structured schedule." i envy you busmama. you are so right about all you said, but especially about giving things up, the things that tie you to babylon. we all know what i am talking about. i am glad you are able to make your way in the world and it is a good example that one day i can also follow. i think school was stressing me out then but now i am done for the summer and i can focus on my child who is due to be born next month. thanks for everything. take care let the love and light surround you and yours chill
besides i still go to rainbow gatherings and that is the only fix i can get from the things that weigh me down, the day to day shit that gets to us all. i have been to the last 5 and am trying to get my van fixed in time to go this year but since i am due on june 30, it would be calling it close. i think it would be a beautiful place to birth my child and actually was planning on it but now i think that i am gonna stay home unless one of those miracles you talk about come my way thanks again chill
