Walden on Wheels: On the Open Road from Debt to Freedom

by Ken Ilgunas

Comfort and security, it seems, when overprescribed, can be poisons to the soul—an illness that no amount of love can cure, freedom being the only antidote.

If Henry Thoreau was my philosophical mentor, Bob Wells was my practical adviser. I’d been reading his how-to vandwelling website, CheapRVLiving.com, for months, learning everything I could. On his site, Wells gives advice on everything you need to know about living in a van: how to pick a van, how to ensure “stealth,” how to install solar panels, even how to go to the bathroom.

Real poverty has little to do with being broke. Real poverty is not being able to change your circumstances. I was playing with poverty; he was living it.

These are society’s definitions of poverty and wealth: To be poor is to have less and to be rich is to have more. Under these definitions, we are always poor, always covetous, always dissatisfied, no matter the size of our salary, or how comfortable we are, or if our needs are in fact fulfilled.

it wasn’t the van that people were drawn to. It was the freedom the van gave me.