With only a week to go, we’re down to camping chairs and cardboard boxes for tables. The grand plan to sell everything we own and set off living a nomadic life has gone well.
Well… mostly.
We’ve still got a bed, though that will be gone by the end of the week. After that, we’ll be down to one sofa for sitting, sleeping, working, eating and owt else two knackered folk can think of doing on a sofa.
Luckily, our landlord’s been champion and said we can leave it behind, so at least we’re guaranteed somewhere to kip right to the end.
What has all this taught us? First off, as I said in an earlier blog, most of the stuff you own is worth nowt unless you “find t’right buyer at t’right time”
As I’m writing this, I’m haggling online over a bed that cost more than €1,000. I’ve asked for €40. He wants to pay €30.
I’m refusing, partly because the mattress cost €800 and is only three years old, but mainly because I’m being a stubbern git.
I’d honestly rather give it away than sell it for €30, which, now I’ve seen it written down, sounds completely daft. But I’ve dug me heels in now, so there’s no going back.
It’s also taught me that we’ll probably never buy owt new again. There are some crackin bargains out there, usually being sold by strange folk who’ve decided to flog everything and become nomads.
Ah….that’ll be us, then.
The total cost of everything we owned came to €15,490. Not a massive fortune, but that’s not t’whole story. We still need winter clothes, camping gear, sailing gear, diving stuff, photographs, a few expensive kitchen bits, two bikes and, most importantly, my tools. I’ll need those for maintaining the rental houses and for volunteering jobs.
At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.. and Noms.
What has properly surprised me is how much stuff we’re keeping. We’ve now got about six cubic metres to store at Noms’ parents’ house.
A massive shout-out to t’legendary John and Chris, who may soon regret ever gaining such a son in law! Other friends like Jenni and Adam are also helping us out… of course they are…Jenni’s a reyt champion Yorkshire lass!
And this is where I’m starting to feel a bit of a fraud.
We imagined ourselves as this cool nomadic couple, travelling t’world with everything we own in two rucksacks. In reality, we’ll be travelling with two rucksacks while six cubic metres of “essential” belongings sit in storage until we’re too old, tired, ill or bored to carry on.
We have been brutal. We’ve sold or given away all t’furniture and appliances.
Apart from a lovely oak table my dad made, because apparently minimalism doesn’t count when sentimental value gets involved.
So there we are. I’m not really a minimalist nomad. I’m more of a hoarding nomad.
I’ll be wandering about in flip-flops with a rucksack, comforted by t’knowledge that a cordless drill, a socket set, some cracking steak knives and a laminating machine are only a twelve-hour flight away.
We might look like free-spirited travellers, but deep down we know we’ve still got a fair way to go before we’re properly free.
Still, tha’s got to start somewhere, hasn’t tha?
