What I Learned About Comfort After Abandoning My Car In West Texas

This post may contain affiliate links. See our affiliate disclaimer here.

I enjoy planning. I like to know what will happen in the next hour. I’d like to know which state I’ll be in or where the next gas station or grocery store will be. Life would be a lot easier if I could just see into the future, not too far, but just far enough to know we don’t run out of food or gas.

I didn’t foresee this being such a problem.

When we left Austin, nearly two months ago, my car rolled behind our RV up and down the hill country roads. We drove slowly, as evidenced by the number of people zooming past us, but we didn’t mind coasting along our first two days through the countryside. We slowly adjusted to driving a nearly 40-ft rig down the highway.

But then we stopped to get gas in Junction, Texas.

Heath pulled around to the pump and we both hopped out of the car. We noticed something wrong with our tow dolly, namely the fact that my car was about to fall off the front. We consulted a mechanic across the street who couldn’t fix the single faulty bolt even using a high-powered electric drill. Things looked pretty hopeless for my car.

Heath and I sat down to make the first big decision of our marriage.

We wanted the comfort of the car. We wanted to park our RV in the countryside and commute into cities in a more manageable vehicle. We wanted to run to the grocery store easily or be able to park in a lot without taking up five spots.

But we didn’t really have a choice. So I hopped in my car, reversed off the dolly and followed Heath an hour south to his Granny’s land in Leakey, Texas. We unpacked everything from the back of my Honda, which served as extra storage, and hit the road without a car.

We haven’t missed it.

We thought we needed the car. Other full-time RVers told us we needed the car.

But here we are in Idaho nearly two months later, and we don’t need it.

Last month, I went five days without a shower. Five horribly long days. When we finally found an RV park on the California coast (we had been staying at state parks with no electricity or water), I showered in small tile shower with a flimsy white curtain listening to the gossip of RVers walking in and out of the women’s restroom. It felt amazing.

Just showering at all is a blessing. Just arriving safely at our next destination or finding a safe place to park Franklin is an enormous blessing.

Sometimes there are comforts in life that feel necessary. There are things we think we need because everyone else seems to need them. Everyone else tows a car or everyone owns their own private shower or everyone else eats out this much.

As necessary as the comfort of my own car or my own shower or my own house sounds, living outside of my comfort zone has taught me gratitude and humility.

Comfort is a privilege. Don’t take it for granted, but welcome it as an unnecessary gift.