David Abrams

I've started publishing some random stuff over at Substack, keeping the old Quivering Pen blog name....but the content will be slightly different this time, a little more personal--and certainly more experimental. So far, I've been testing the waters with some poetry (today, it's "Jesus Breaks Bread With Lazarus"), but gliding into more of an essay/journal format in the future. I'll certainly be posting about what I'm reading, so booklovers need not fear. This is all a work in progress and it will be raw and unpolished at times. Thanks to all of you who come along for the ride (I'm keeping as much content free as I can, for now).

Jesus Breaks Bread with Lazarus It was a Friday and Jesus had stopped by for dinner.M&M were in the kitchen—as usual—so it was just ChristAnd a few of the guys and we were all pretty much in our cups at that point,Except J.C., who said someone had to drink water and stay soberTo keep us all on the straight path when we walked ...

Most of you are already on board, but just in case you hadn't heard the news, we've sold our house in Helena, Montana and are moving full-time into Sugar, our Winnebago Solis Pocket van with our three cats. Yep, you heard me correctly: 2 aging adults and 3 cats in a 17-foot van! It's a big, bold move and we're feeling ALL the feels right now (mostly good feels, but we have our days....). We're hanging around western Montana for another week, then we'll venture out across the Pacific Northwest, for starters.

I plan to document the adventure in a series of short films, and I hope you'll follow along on my You Tube channel: https://www.youtube.com/

(I'm in the early stages, so I could really use some subscribers to help get me boosted)

I'm going dark on social media for the first month or so, as a way to recharge my spiritual batteries and to gather footage to illustrate the next chapter of our lives. In the meantime, here's a trailer I made to whet your appetite: https://youtu.be/oPcRTPIZBtI?si=tHZzBH9zK5yKeUZf

See you on the other side!

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"Coming in Fall 2024: a radical change in our lives!

The Van Life Diaries will document our life as a married couple in their 60s who embark on full-time life in their Winnebago Solis Pocket van. Did we mention the three cats who are coming along for the ride?

Subscribe to the channel and keep up with Sugar the Van as she travels the United States (and beyond)."

Once again, Tom Gauld nails the Writing Life.

June 3, 1983: Jean and I go on our first date after meeting for the first time a week earlier. The movie is "Flashdance," popcorn fills our mouths, our hearts beat to the music, and despite our individual anxieties and insecurities (or perhaps *because* of them), we fall in love...eventually. Little did we know that day, that June 3rd, was a Significant Life Event and would mark a turning point in our history. We got married 6 months later, to the day.

June 3, 2024: Jean and I put our house up for sale in Helena, Montana, and begin final plans to move into our campervan full-time. This, too, is a Significant Life Event and we feel like we're on the path to rewriting our future history (oxymoron intended).

Yes, it's true!!! We are, in the very near future, about to live full time with the three cats in Sugar, our 19-foot Winnebago Solis Pocket. We are going to reinvent ourselves on the road, reconnect with each other (after 41 years of marriage there are a few frayed ends that need reconnecting), and explore undiscovered (to us) places on this continent and others. We'll live in the moment and lower our blood pressure. We will slow down and listen. We’ll lift our eyes from our phones and look. We'll bathe in the forest and wade in the ocean. We'll roll across the prairies, we'll taste the city life. We will--we think, we hope--be better people on the road.

This may come as a shock to some of you, others saw it coming down the road. We've been holding on to this news for several months, until we could get all the pieces in place to make it public. The time is now. I've given notice at my job, we've downsized our possessions to within an inch of our lives, we've yard-saled away our once-valuable goods and keepsakes, we've donated boxes of clothes and other home goods to local charities, until finally we've emptied this house to a shell (we're leaving a few furnishings for the next owner). Our footsteps echo when we walk through the house, reminding us that a house is only a home when it's lined with your possessions, the bits and pieces of You. There's a tinge of melancholy hanging in the air of the house, the ghosts of memories from the past four years drift through the rooms and up the staircase, and my heart hurts a little when I walk into the backyard and know soon I'll have to leave our little garden-terrace paradise (with its resident magpies, chickadees, deer, and squirrels).

But one glance in the direction of the future and that wistfulness thins and vanishes. The future is bright. The future is euphoric. The future is waiting.

*The future is also a little scary and I'd be lying if I didn't say it feels a little like running toward the cliff's edge with a hang-glider strapped to our backs. When we drop over the side, we trust the Universe will catch us with an air current.

We'll still hang around Helena this summer (and perhaps into the fall) as we wait for the house to sell. As we do, we'll start transitioning into van life with the cats, getting them more acclimated to living inside Sugar. Soon, we expect they'll be treating the campervan as their "safe space." We already see signs of their "vanxieties" melting away as they show more interest in Sugar (i.e., they've sniffed the tires and paced around her perimeter with curiosity bordering on approval). They'll be fine, we'll all be good. Sugar herself is excited, revving her engine at the thought of rubber meeting road. "Let's go!" she calls.

We will, we will. But first, let's see about getting that house sold!

Here's the link to the listing: https://portal.onehome.com/en-US/consumer-share/MTg5MTY0OTAjTVRSIzE5NDU1IzE=

Please help spread the word about our lovely 2 bed, 2 bath (with Airbnb cottage included!) for sale here in Helena. It's a gem in a nice tree-lined neighborhood and we couldn't be happier/sadder about selling it to someone else to enjoy.