A major curveball no one saw coming...not even us!

Continued from We need to talk about this.

This past year has left us wading through a sea of crises, of both literal and existential form. Sharing our emotional arc in the last post exposed some vulnerabilities, but it was the only way to provide context for what we're about to announce here. We made a huge decision that might seem like it came out of left field, if you don't know the full story.

In the last post, I talked about the quiet moments being most welcome in our travels – little moments like watching Tanner walk in the dog park or sitting surrounded by Florida birds.

These times weren't about adventures or activities. We used them to process everything we had endured over the past several months. We could also resume a sense of normalcy: taking our morning walks, getting work done, and doing chores.

Normalcy was our goal after leaving Florida. We parked ourselves off I-95 in South Carolina for 4 blissful, mundane days at the Yemassee KOA. In the greater context of our lives, you can see how much we needed this. But we didn't get it. The night after we arrived, our inverter fried, leaving us without power and forcing us into emergency troubleshooting, chasing down a replacement inverter, and living with a limited power setup. We're in the middle of that story now, because at the time of writing this post, we still haven't gotten our inverter replaced.

In that moment – sitting in a powerless RV, smelling residual electrical burning, and worrying about an emergency displacement the next day – we reached the nadir of our existential crisis. I sat there yelling and wailing, imploring to whatever higher power would listen, "WHAT DID WE DO WRONG?! JUST TELL ME WHAT WE DID TO DESERVE ALL THIS!" The kind of low-point breakdown where you realize that life doesn't actually care if you're a good person trying to make responsible decisions. Some chapters of life will test you, but in that moment, I felt like we had been failing the test over and over, despite our best efforts. The RV was powerless, and I felt the same way.

What was scarier, though, was that Anthony – usually the emotionally contained one – was feeling the same way. He expressed it in less dramatic fashion, of course, but hearing him say the words, "I feel it too, Nicole" was worrisome. This wasn't just me having a "bad day." This was both of us feeling the weight of the last 9 months crushing us.

"I'm done, Anthony," I said. "I'm done. I'm not doing this anymore. I'll just live here."

When one reaches a breaking point, the body signals threat and looks for an escape – any escape. What's the opposite of RV life? Staying still and going nowhere. It made perfect biological sense, but certainly not logical sense. It was a breaking point, after all. People don't think logically during a breaking point. Breaking points are visceral and emotional.

"We like South Carolina. If we lived here, where would you want to live?"

Anthony paused for a moment before responding, "We like Myrtle Beach."

I immediately went onto rental websites, with no intention of actually pursuing something, of course. But then the first result made me go wide-eyed. A gorgeous townhouse, $400/month less expensive than the NH rental, and the cherry on top: 3 pets max.

Wait a sec. Is this a thing here?! We weren't surprised about the lower cost of living. That's just geography. But do management companies have different limits on accepted pets? Sure enough, more research yielded several rentals with a 3 pets max or a promising "pet-friendly" or "pets considered" description that sounded like there was flexibility.

Bet you can guess what we did next!

As if! We're not crazy! We closed the rental websites, went to sleep, and woke up early the next day to start our electrical system rewiring. Anthony successfully bypassed the inverter and saved us from an emergency displacement. We walked over to the office, where they had a cafe, and got 2 well-earned lattes. Then we went about our day, recovering from last night's mayhem and trying to salvage the mundane normalcy that led us to Yemassee in the first place.

The mere consideration of a completely different life felt like a lift. Mentally, we found a way to get out of this revolving door and start gaining control over our lives again. In reality, it might not actually be true. In order to get a rental, we'd need to prove income or some other assets, and our past 9 months hadn't really set us up for ease in the financial realm. We had the financial means, but proving it would be more work than just submitting a couple recent pay stubs. Plus...another move? After November's crash and burn, would we actually put ourselves and the pets through that? To live in a region almost 1,000 miles from where we plan to settle?

The idea was refreshing, but that's all it was – an idea, floating in the ether to make us feel less stuck. But something shifted. Those cosmic forces raining down on us, blow after blow.... They all just...stopped.

The weather turned beautiful. We were worried about our 30amp site and having limited air conditioning in the hot temps, but our campsite stayed in a perfect temperature range. We had no issues finishing our stay on 30amps. We got the normalcy we had been seeking – time to do work, take walks, and have more lattes at the cafe.

We stopped having RV emergencies. Travel days were smooth. We didn't need to do any repairs on our own, and then Trailers of the East Coast took care of a bunch of the rest of them. We found our groove in the absence of an inverter, tucking ourselves at 50amp hookup sites so we could run on full power. It felt like Season 1 all over again, especially when we returned to 2 campsites that we visited when we were newbies: Barnyard RV Park, our 4th campground of full-time RV life, and Tanglewood Park, our first campground ever. But unlike Season 1, we were filled with know-how and experience. And now, we finally had the capacity to reminisce about the good ol' days and smile about how far we've come as RVers and as people.

Money started flowing. Anthony was offered a contract job while he waited for another contract job to start up. Then, he got word about a third contract project that he applied for 7 months prior but heard nothing. The absence of RV emergencies finally gave me the space to launch a project that kept getting delayed. My creativity returned.

If just envisioning a different life was enough to change the tides, then we were good, right? We could get our plans back in order to build our mountain cabin in Spring 2027, and we could enjoy RV life until then.

But it wasn't that simple. The tide may have shifted, but more RV problems are inevitable. At the very least, we were eyeing a long displacement to get our roof replaced. There was also the elephant in the room: we weren't supposed to still be full-time. Our hearts hadn't been in it for a while, and our struggle to get off the road was making us resent the RV life. We kept saying to each other, "Wow, we thought we had a tough time launching on the road. Never in a million years would we have thought getting off the road would be even harder!"

We had to at least consider that things were aligning for a reason. Had my breakdown carved a new path we actually want to step down? We needed to look into it more. No pressure...just gathering information and seeing how we feel.

After our appointment at Trailers of the East Coast, we hung around the Carolinas for a few days. We expected our inverter replacement to come in during that time. This way we could be fully back up and running for our return to New England, which we planned for most of May and June. While we waited for word on the new inverter, we drove down to Myrtle Beach. We wrote a review about Ocean Lakes Family Campground, where we stayed. Now you have some insight into what was going on behind the scenes. Coupled with our peaceful morning walks on the beach and enjoyment of the amenities, we were looking at rentals – actual foot-in-door, get-the-tour house hunting. We hadn't done that in 12 years!

At first, it was just a test. The places look good on paper, but are they good in reality? Then gauging our energy of actually being in each space. Would any of the places feel right? Could we envision Myrtle Beach as a place to live, not just a place to visit once in a while? Because Anthony was right – we do like Myrtle Beach. We already know that it's one of our favorite places to visit along the East Coast. I even said in our Myrtle Beach blog post, "2017 was my first visit to the Carolinas, and I immediately felt a sense of ease. That feeling has never dissipated. South Carolina in particular continues to be one of my favorite states visited."

Even in terms of living here, the notion wasn't totally out of left field. We had already discussed a future where we had our mountain home in NH, and then possibly winter down in SC with the RV, or maybe rent a cottage if finances allowed. But this was a consideration for years down the road.

But that's the funny thing about life. It's not linear. And sometimes when we're stuck in a revolving door, the best way out is to smash the glass. After all, we chose to RV full-time. We're not exactly conventional people on a linear path.

This was the energetic alignment we needed to start seeing things clearly. We started calling it "conventional structure for the unconventional soul." Whenever we've made life decisions that followed this, we found fulfillment. We decided to move in together just 7 months after we met, and we adopted Tanner at the same time. It worked. We bought a house in the Boston suburbs so Anthony could commute into the city for work. It was fine, but it didn't align. We sold the house and launched into RV life so we could buy land in NH. At first, it felt like a cosmic fight, perhaps too unconventional for us. But we found our stride, and we kept our promise that this unconventional life would lead to structure we most desired. Buying the land was one of the most aligned things we've ever done. We want a house. But we don't want the house in the suburbs. We want a house in the forest, with hiking trails right outside our doorstep, and an orchard where we can dabble in homesteading, and a place to park our RV so it's there whenever we feel the road calling us again.

Now we had this new idea: a coastal retreat. Would it offer us practical structure with an unconventional energy? This was one answer we hoped to find, along with the answers to all the logical questions: Will the layout work for Tanner? Is the price within our budget? Do we like the location? Can we find a place that won't be a repeat of November? The best part was, if none of the places resonated, we didn't need to rent one. We could rent or not. We could look anywhere else in the country! The nomadic life has taught us which regions we could see ourselves living in. We've found little bits of home everywhere from South Carolina, to Michigan, to Wisconsin, to Montana, to Utah.

But we did find a place. A few, actually, that were real contenders, but only one that met all our criteria. We didn't need perfect; we needed a place that invited us in and said, "Hey guys, this is your bridge." That's what we're calling it. A bridge. A home-base in the central part of the East Coast, where we can easily head in either direction to see family. A contained space – not too big, not too small – with a layout that makes sense for a senior dog. Natural light for the cats. A separate office space for my instruments and equipment. A quiet neighborhood. But not a place that feels like we're "getting a house." This cottage feels like a vacation home. It has a brightly colored exterior. The neighborhood has fun, leisurely amenities. The place felt like an exhale before we even started moving furniture in.

It was a bold move, for sure. We credit RV life for giving us the courage to follow through with plans that feel right for us. That's the key here. The choice wasn't reckless. The precipitator was an emotional breaking point, but that's what made us pay attention. After that, everything was thoughtful and strategic. We didn't escape a tough chapter of life. We let an opportunity unfold and followed the path with curiosity. And honestly? It worked. We're not completely recovered from the past 9 months, but we feel we're being proactive in our lives again. We're nourishing parts of ourselves that have been dormant for a long time – the selves that both grew up by the beach but never truly figured out how we do coastal living. The selves that want to make a home where we can breathe easy, but still have adventures when they call to us.

Which brings us to the question that we're sure is on everyone's mind: What about the RV?

We're still planning on traveling. This cottage will serve as our home-base until we can build our cabin. And who knows? Maybe if we love it, a SC home-base will remain a priority. But we'll cross that bridge when we get there. For now, we're just excited to finally give us the stability we've been seeking for a long time, so we can put the enjoyment back in RVing.

And the next question: What happened to our plans to head up to New England in May?

Well, the inverter didn't come during our few days at Ocean Lakes like we hoped. In fact, other developments happened that made us question if we'd get the inverter at all! After discovering our campsite had availability for one more night, we extended our stay at Ocean Lakes. This bought us time to digest everything with the rentals and our travel plans. Then, that final night, we sat down to face the overwhelm.

Plan A: Book it up to New England without the inverter. This effectively means we can't stay at either home-base, at least not for long, because we need electric hookups. One hot day and we'd be forced to run our generator nonstop to get AC. We could book campsites, but this quickly turned into a logistical nightmare. We had a big to-do list. In NH, we needed to get things out of storage. We launched back on the road so quickly that we didn't even have time to grab our camping gear, like our tent and ebikes! We're also trapped in a constantly increasing monthly storage fee, so we need to clear out our unit and close that baby down. Then on top of everything else, we were finally in a financial position to buy the remaining acreage on our property. Last year, our neighbor who sold us the initial parcel offered us a 2-acre border extension, and we accepted...but the actual purchase got delayed, for obvious reasons.

In MA, we had more stuff to get out of storage at my parents' house, namely things we want for the cottage. Tanner was due for his next vet appointment. Then we hoped to make plans with friends and family. Winter wasn't exactly conducive to fun get-togethers, and then we left so hastily that half our friends didn't even know we were gone! All these moving parts made it practically impossible to book campsites ahead of time and know where we needed to be when.

Plan A left us paralyzed. We hadn't leased a cottage yet and initially thought we'd wait until later in June. This way, we could do our New England trip, then come back down and start moving in. Looking at the timeline, we realized, this was exactly the kind of travel that sets us up for issues: no room for error, tons of fast moving, and pressure to get everything done. We were not in the right mental state for that undertaking.

So I laid a Plan B on the table. What if, instead of leasing a cottage in June, we lease one immediately? What if we stay in Myrtle Beach and start moving in now, and delay our trip to New England for later in the summer?

We went through every step to see if it made logical sense. Some parts didn't. We wouldn't be able to close our storage unit or get Tanner his vet appointment at an optimal time. But those can be solved. A couple more months paying for storage isn't the end of the world, and we could (and should) find Tanner a vet in SC anyways, so maybe we just do that sooner than planned.

Plan B was the way to go. We gave the leasing agent a big surprise when we filled out the application and opted for an immediate move-in. She thought we made a mistake! But it wasn't a mistake. Surprise, yes, but not a mistake.

And that's how we finally successfully changed course and began our transition into part-time RV life. What a trip! But we were far from settled. Suddenly, we found ourselves in limbo between an empty future cottage and an RV that didn't have a campsite for the foreseeable future. We had a lot to still figure out.

To be continued.