It’s the ninth day into our van build. We’ve gutted almost everything previously built into the van. There were a lot of pieces. This is because the previous owner, whom we’ve named Steve, built his own mobile man cave inside Alevander.
We have two small hills of 2x4s and plywood sheets scattered across our driveway and in our garage. The trash can and recycling bin are already packed to the brim, so packed in fact that the trash truck refused to pick them up!
Yes – we are so close to starting building! We’re almost to the stage of having a blank canvas to work with.
Then, we peel back the rubberized floor covering in the middle of the van. This, we think, is one of the final – and easier – steps in gutting the van. That’s when I see…
Holey Hell
Our van floor had a hole in it. The hole was about the size of a bowling ball – and was right on top of the fuel tank.
(I later found out Steve put this hole in on purpose. His strategy was to cut this hole as a shortcut to enable easier access to the fuel tank pump, an item that often needs repair, instead of paying to drop the fuel tank each time. But, I did not know this when I first saw the huge surprise.)
And so there I was – almost at what I thought was the last step before we could start our van build. I got pretty upset. As in, really upset. I stared at the hole for quite a bit. I sighed deeply. This sucked, I thought. There was a gigantic hole in the middle of the van! Above the fuel tank! What the fuck, Steve?!
The annoyance was all the more heightened because I thought I was over Steve’s surprises. While the van’s cabinetry was pretty decent (with the exception of many unnecessary screws), Steve was very haphazard with his electrical wiring. There were power strips plugged into power strips, plugged into even more power strips scattered across the van. One power strip was mounted via screws into the ground plug. When we finally removed all that, I thought I was done with Steve. Turns out, not yet!
A Hole Different Perspective
Still upset, still filing away, I said aloud without meaning it:
I’m fortunate to have this hole.
Fortunately, time heals all wounds. Since first seeing the hole, I’ve since had a snack and a nap. And, now I’ve come to mean it when I say:
This is a good problem to have.
Of course, it’s still pretty annoying that we’ve now got the additional errand (and expense) of getting a body shop to fix a classic-Steve move. But, that’s not to say that in the big scheme of things this is all rather awesome. I must remember why I’ve got this hole problem anyway: because we’re taking a gap year to explore Central America. And that is awesome. That is amazing. And for that, I have a hole lot of gratitude.
