The Rough & Tumble are having themselves a throwback September. This little folk band is going to zig zag its way down to Florida and back up through Georgia and the Carolinas just like the olden days when they were cramming into Mallory's Chevy Cobalt. Back like when they were always one turn away from a suitcase falling on Butter's head and to-go boxes were littering the dash. They will be piecing together motel rooms and the kindness of strangers into the fall, yucking it up with the best of them.
This is because The R&T is homeless, now.
Yesterday, we dropped our cardboard box off at the camper doctor's place and ran down our long list of how it has almost killed us. They think they can fix it. But whether they can or they can't, we are without it for the next 4 - 6 weeks. Because that's how long camper doctors take. Which is how we ended up back in Nashville a couple months early.
And, truthfully, we are a little excited. All this luxury of carrying our home everywhere we go, being in a familiar place in our own bed every night was really making us lose our edge. And when the literal roof over your head is coming off, it's an added incentive to embrace the future adventure and take a break from the mundane, comfortable life of using our own coffee mugs and knowing that we have leftovers in the mini fridge. And it's still an upgrade from the old Cobalt-- Butter won't be holding up our cooler with her tail, this time. And we will get to sleep in motel beds where our feet don't hang over the edge like they do in the camper. We are getting to see what a life paired down from a life already paired down looks like.
It feels a little naked right now. We've spent months having everything we own attached to us. We imagine this is what the box turtle feels like without his box. But our new normal is already starting to set in, and we are finding ourselves in the company of friends rather than reading comic books by ourselves in our little house. That may have a little to do with all of our kind friends and families and fans reaching out to us in the last couple weeks with common questions like, "Are you okay?!" and "What is happening?!" and "Ummmm... guys?" The thing about being homeless is that home becomes more of a people than a place. It's something we maybe forgot. Before we were even without a house, we had more offers back in Nashville for a place to rest than we could take anyone up on. We had people from all over the country wishing us well and asking to help. Our house was falling apart, but our home was reaching out, completely in tact.
Maybe that is what our camper has been trying to tell us all along. It literally has been busting at the seams trying to get us to look outside of ourselves. A friendly letter would have been nice, but some folk bands are tough to persuade. We are getting the message, now.