3/26/2020 –

Living life during a pandemic for me means living in one room.  Bet your feelin’ pretty good about being in the comfort of your own 1,500-square foot home about now, huh?

What our hotel does not have is a gym, lobby or lounge.  What it does have is a tiny square of counter between the sink and the mini-stove.  This means after each meal I wash every dish (all two of them), dry them and put them away.  It is keeping me quite tidy.  I did not ask for help in this particular area of my life, but there it is.  (Find the positive, people!)

Since we have travelled to Europe many times, we have had the conversation about whether or not we could live with less.  Less space.  Less stuff.  Part of this crazy experiment of life on the road without an address is about that.  I sold a lot of items off in order to put as few things as possible into storage before going on the road.  I suppose if I had the ability to customize my space I could make my current 300-square feet work much more efficiently.  There are a ton of websites that specialize in maximizing small spaces.  Unfortunately, I cannot customize this space. 

In general, I do not feel cramped most of the time (except while trying to function in my “kitchenette”).  The issue we seem to be having is privacy.  If my husband is one the phone with a client or in an online meeting, he needs me to be both quiet and relatively still.  Those of you who have met me can stop laughing now!  There is not enough space for us to be far enough apart to allow us BOTH to be online talking (or on the phone) at the same time.

Welcome to our office. 

This is an interesting way to learn what’s important to me.  I recently read a book about a woman who gave away 70% of her belongings in a year-long social experiment.  The Year of Less by Cait Flanders was a cool little book.  (Cait, if you read this, how about helping a fellow sister out and sharing my blog link?) I always thought it was the stuff that would matter to me.  That is partially true.  Afterall, I do have a 10 X 20 storage unit containing furniture and storage bins.  But, I am starting to realize that giving up space is harder for me.  It doesn’t matter if the rooms are small, but I do need there to be more than ONE of them!  And, no, for you comedians out there, we have not yet resorted to one of us sitting on the bathroom floor in order to get our work done.