Kora turns one in a few days. She's still an adolescent in dog terms, but the anniversary of her birth and her burgeoning maturity have me thinking about her needs. Food, water and regular access to a place to relieve herself. Shade from our relentless summer sun and a dry place during afternoon thunder storms. Because she's an Australian Shepherd, Kora needs to run. And run. And run. She runs for the thrill of exertion. She craves the rush of acceleration as much as any teenaged boy ever loved to floor an accelerator. She runs for the joy of knowing that she is not bound to any place. When the orange frisbee catches a tail wind and sails over her head, Kora streaks to a pace that my aging bones and muscles refuse to accept at face value. Pure, dizzying speed. Surely she becomes possessed by the spirits of countless generations of long-dead timber wolves clenched in the far-from-certain struggle to overtake and attack. Blinding speed that leads to death that leads to life for the pack. As far as we know, Kora's never killed anything larger than an insect. Her meals show up twice a day with no more effort on her part than the training ritual of "down, stay" before she's allowed to eat. Still, something inside her knows that her job is to run, and even though the prize is a well caught flying disc, not the throat of a deer or elk, the purity of her pleasure as she leaps high and snatches that spinning saucer from the air often causes me to gasp and applaud wildly. Some part of my soul makes that leap with her.
Kora has other needs. She needs to spend as much time as possible with her humans. This works well for us, since we need to be needed. She needs time and space and tools for healing when she's sick or injured. We provide the space and tools as best we can. She needs to ride with us. When "Mom" is not along, she sits in the passenger seat and hangs out the window to feel the wind and observe the world from so high. Kora needs to have her belly scratched. She can approach a trance-like state while I'm rubbing her. I can almost make out her mantra. "Cowwww. Cowwww." She would argue this next point, but she needs an occasional bath and trim. She sometimes needs to lie beside my bed and have me pet her neck and chest. One night she needed to get in bed with us during a thunderstorm. One of her most important needs is for us to keep her from following her enormous curiosity and wandering away from our protection.
The effort I've put into assessing Kora's needs has helped me with the housetruck build. Other than the craving for speed, our needs are not that different than hers. We are addicted to audiovisual entertainment as we drift off to sleep and we enjoy bathing. We need more shelter in cold weather than she does. Since we have opposable thumbs, we have accumulated tools and trinkets that need a place. We prefer our food hot and some of our drinks cold. Our furnishings are larger and more elaborate than hers. We play music and talk on phones and use a computer and preserve vegetables and cook in Dutch ovens. We fly fish and bicycle and sew and build musical instruments. Obviously, not all these are "needs", but we're not likely to give them up unless forced, and it's no accident that our housetruck is more than just a large dog house. We've known all along that one moderate-sized housetruck will not accommodate all the interests and activities I've listed, and we're working to figure out what fits mobility and what needs a more-fixed base.
I want our truck to meet our needs without superfluity. Nothing merely for show. No large "extra" space. No gadgets that are never used. No clothes that are never worn. And yet, mere utility is not enough. Like Kora jumping to catch the frisbee, something in me occasionally needs to leap free of the grasp of gravity and temporal momentum and touch the face of generations past. Part of me longs to stand midwife for unborn hope in a world filled with gloomy possibility. I believe that a housetruck should facilitate THOSE needs as well as basic bodily needs — partly through its ability to travel to inspiring places, but mostly through its thoughtfully crafted form and function. When home "feels right", then one's reach is more likely to exceed one's grasp.
Colin Fletcher was known to wax eloquent about his emotional attachment to his backpack. Colin spent much of his life walking the wide world, dependent mostly on what he carried. His choices of gear and supplies and arrangement evolved through decades of trial and error. In "The Complete Walker," he spoke of his relationship with his loaded pack and of his anxiety whenever forced to separate from it when he was out walking. I'm already developing that sort of attachment to our step van. I'm becoming convinced that a housetruck should fit like an expensive, well fitted and well worn shoe. And there lies the rub.
Part of me doubts that I'm up the challenge of "thoughtfully crafted form and function." I have experience and ability and tools. I used to make my living as a building contractor and mechanic. I've previously built both a housetruck and a housebus. I've built two houses that we lived in. I've thought about and researched this project, but this is the first time we're living full time in something that rolls. I confess my self-imposed intimidation. I have every excuse of being busy for the past few months, but the fact is that we've been living since the end of March in a mostly empty box that moves. We enjoy an acceptable level of comfort and convenience, but most of that is exterior to the truck. Part of me is itching to move the project along, but.... Truth is, I need to get a few things out of the way first.
Some of my trepidation is related to a flaw in my character. I can never build anything without putting major energy into planning the NEXT version of that thing: improving the design, choosing better or more cost-effective materials, polishing the details. Don't misunderstand. I finish most of what I start, and I know and care enough to do good work, but the future plan is always some distraction to the current project. I already know that I want to build one more house vehicle — probably on the lines of a showman's wagon — and that knowledge deflects some of the focus I need for this truck build. And that brings me to what I want to say.
I need inspiration. Knowledge is wonderful, and I treasure what I've learned from the rest of you, but inspiration is what makes things happen. Please keep posting what you're working on. Include pictures. Talk about your choices and their reasons. I suspect that our group is smaller than it was before Sharkey handed over the reins, but Stuart is doing a great job and the need for nomadic housing is growing. Show the rest of us what you're doing in your life and your truck or bus or boat or whatever, and I promise I won't bore you as much talking about my dog.
Jim in North Caroliina
![Image](http://i48.tinypic.com/2d2dog6.jpg)