Finding a Home After a Decade of Nomadic Travel

After almost ten years of traveling the world with everything we needed on our backs, we are doing something that will change our lives yet again:

We are hanging up the backpacks and getting a home address.

An actual physical address.
One that receives snail mail.
One where we might even form routines again.

Trin’s mother will also join us for this next chapter of life. We just celebrated her 85th birthday in Sweden. She is a happy, grateful human being, and she is a blessing.

Cover image: Trin and his mom hamming it up on a trail in Sweden this past summer.

We’ve lived in extreme minimalism for so long that the idea of collecting “stuff” again feels both foreign and a little dangerous. How do we scale up from two backpacks without letting clutter win? Is that even possible?

Three weeks ago, our nomad adventure officially concluded. Trin flew to California to help his mom pack to move in with us and settle appointments and paperwork for her move. I flew to Arizona to get our home ready. Today, Trin and Momma Lulu are finally coming home, and I’m so excited. These last three weeks have felt a bit like cleaning and then decorating for someone’s surprise birthday party: you can’t wait to see them, but if they’re late… well, it gives you a few extra minutes to finish setting a few more things up.

Flying Into Arizona

My sister picked me up at the Phoenix airport on November 13th. The moment I landed, I remembered something I love about America — people talk to strangers here. The border agent welcomed me home. A mom struggling with a baby’s stroller and a cart of luggage let me push the stroller with the most adorable little one inside; another traveler helped me escape the maze of the terminal. 

I spent the night at my sister’s, then early the next morning drove to what would soon become our home.

Seeing the House Again

We bought this house in 2016 but only saw it once for a very brief walk through just before launching into our world travel. A tenant lived there at the time, then several more over the years. After a decade of renters and a lot of life later, I’ll be seeing it for only the second time.

What I walked into felt overwhelming

The tan grout on the tile floor was blackened with grime.
Fan blades carried thick coats of dusty fur that fell like snakes when tapped.
The kitchen sink drained straight into the cupboard below.
Sticky tile counters, spilled juices cemented in place, blackened refrigerator crevices, cupboard doors hanging loose.
The tub was layered with years of grime and peeling paint from a poorly done resurfacing.
The bathroom walls… hair, so much hair, little curly hairs. It even clung to the ceiling.

I didn’t even want to set my backpack down, and it has rested on the ground in some very questionable places around the world.

Cleaning Begins

I borrowed a heavy-duty steamer from my sister, drove to Walmart for supplies, and got to work. Sweeping alone produced rolling pellets of caked dust that looked like small turds marching across the floor.

That first night, the house simply wasn’t clean enough to stay in, so I returned to my sister’s.

The next morning, armed with an air mattress and more cleaning supplies, I returned. My sister lent me a camping chair so I could take brief breaks. She also armed me with a few tools so I could tear up the base of the cabinet under the sink, take the moldy swollen boards to the dumpster and check on the condition of the subfloor. Thankfully, the subfloor is in good shape, and we wanted to redo the kitchen, anyway.

I scraped, steamed, scrubbed, wiped, mopped, and battled the grime of a decade.

I survived on protein shakes and yogurt.
I bought bread, tuna, mayo, and pickles to make sandwiches… and then realized I didn’t have a can opener. One doesn’t carry that around in a backpack!

My days took on a strange rhythm:

Clean until my arms shook.
Collapse.
Sleep.
Repeat.

Then came the dishwasher incident.

A pool of stagnant water lay in the dishwasher’s basin. Mind you, the tenant just vacated a week ago—how does this happen?! I turn it on for a cycle to see if it works at all. The water exits from the machine into the garbage disposal and proceeds to back up into the sink (the side that thankfully isn’t leaking); however, the level is rising and getting ready to spill into the side that is leaking. 

I grabbed a two-liter plastic bottle I’d cut in half earlier to use as a washbasin and sprinted back and forth, filling it from the rising sink and dumping it into the tub. It worked, but what remained in the sink looked like vomit.

Still, day by day, the house slowly became recognizable as a place humans could live.

Reconnecting with Friends

Sunday morning I took time off from cleaning to visit the church Trin and I have been virtual members of during our travels. It’s also the place I briefly worked when COVID had us stuck in one place for a while — after our visas expired in Australia and we got deported from Finland! It was great to see so many familiar faces. My friend Jackie and her husband Bill invited me out for lunch. I ordered a good ol’ American burger. They are just not the same anywhere else in the world.

That night, one corner of the living room felt clean enough to roll out the air mattress and sleep. That felt like victory.

On Monday morning, my friend Hanna stopped by. I had but one chair. She refused to sit, so we both stood and talked for two hours. I didn’t even have a cup to offer her water. I’ll need to do something about that!

That evening, my friend Julia flew in from Hungary, so I offered to pick her up. We stopped at my place on the way to her home. One look at my little air mattress and she immediately offered her spare bed anytime I needed a night off the floor. We picked up takeout, made it to her house — and then jet lag hit us both like a brick. I stayed the night. I’d stay the night again later that week after she invited me to a late evening jazz concert. 

On Tuesday, Trin’s brother and his wife stopped by to see our place and take me to brunch as a welcome home. It will be wonderful to live only 20 minutes from them.

The cleaning was exhausting, but I never felt alone. Friends stopped by, audiobooks kept me sane, and slowly, slowly, the house began to change.

Week one passed. Still so much to fix and clean. Still just a camping chair, my air mattress, and my backpack — but I bought a can opener!

The following week, the week of Thanksgiving, was unexpected and overwhelming — to the point of tears.

But Trin and Momma Lulu are almost home, and I’ll have to tell you about that in the next post.