I'm in the midst of a logistical "puzzle" - but still with the same big dream. I'd love your input!

Today was a FOUR STATE day!
Virginia,
Tennessee,
North Carolina
and Georgia!

September 4, 2022 – Sunday
On our way through Asheville, NC, today!

Hi all. I am in the midst of a bit of a logistical puzzle. Luckily, everything is mostly ok … but my plans for the coming month (and beyond) have been just a wee bit derailed – with the “micro-Lead-Safe-Mama-Mobile” breaking down this week! So I am trying to regroup and come up with a new plan a.s.a.p. — and I would love your ideas / feedback / brainpower on this one, because I don’t think I can figure out this puzzle without help!

The car… on a better day…

If you have been following my articles and stories over the past month or so, you will know that (in early August) I flew to Boston to pick up the micro “Lead Safe Mama Mobile” [which I had left back East when I broke my leg on January 6, 2021], and drive it home. Unfortunately, the car had been sitting for 6 or 8 months (in Boston) without being driven — and unbeknownst to me [but as predicted by my husband, when he learned that it had in fact not been being driven at all], this fatally damaged the engine! The car seemed to be working okay for a bit (miraculously, exactly 20 days, actually!), before it gave up the ghost. Continue reading below the image of the Fiat being towed – earlier this week.

Why I’m on the road with my kids…. (for those new here)

Given my children’s disabilities, combined with the cost of care and the fact that they can demonstrably learn so much more (including history, geography, sociology & political science, math & economics, art, and more!) traveling with me than they ever can learn from books & media, I often have my two youngest sons (now 14 and 17) travel with me on some of my longer work trips (as long as it doesn’t conflict with other schooling opportunities in their life).

I punctuate these work-travel-trips by alternating work-focused days with fun / education / world-exploration days (some of which are also work-related!), and I often let the kids choose the points of interest that we visit along our way — so they are participating in the itinerary planning, too, including responding to what my husband described as the “exigencies and vicissitudes of the un-anticipated conditions and circumstances of the journey” (translation: “when stuff changes” – like the car suddenly dies! lol), as well as learning from the experience!.

Bringing my children on work trips with me, besides being necessary for many reasons, is a unique way of enabling me to simultaneously work full-time on the road and also care for my children full-time — while making sure they are learning and growing, and staying healthy, too! [Continue reading below the image… which is the current route that hits both my work appointments and things the kids want to do if we are able to continue this journey!]

Our journey so far…

Upon arriving on the East Coast – I first helped a family in Connecticut find the mystery source(s) of Lead exposure for their baby, and we then spent the first part of this journey with an unexpected / unplanned (and super fun) trip to Martha’s Vineyard (“all-expenses-paid”, no less! – including an amazing – yet quite funky – place to stay and a ferry pass for the car!). The Vineyard trip was purely personal – an opportunity to help my 90-year-old friend (my late-mother’s best friend) see a concert and visit with her family in Martha’s Vineyard (note her walker and her suitcase in the kayaks – image below. Continue reading below the image!).

After the trip to the Vineyard, and with “Nana S.” in tow, we then made our way up to Maine [visiting Maine was already on the agenda — as I am looking at relocating to Maine (if/when our home sells), but I offered to drive Nana S. home to Bar Harbor – since we were already headed north].

A primary reason to check out Maine on this trip was that I wanted to spend some time looking at property there (including some specific properties I had identified online in recent months.) The current plan (if our house in Portland, Oregon sells) is to find both a new home for us and a commercial location to house Lead Safe Mama HQ! Since the kids are with me, this was also a good opportunity to show the area to the kids…to get them used to the idea of relocation, if that ends up coming to pass). So many balls in the air in Tamara’s life — as always!

We then drove down from Maine, with a plan to head back west towards Oregon, after one last hug goodbye from (and attending one last musical performance of) my two older sons in Boston (two photos below — from their performance last week at the ICA in Boston)…with planned educational/ historical/ world-schooling stops in Newport, Rhode Island, and Mystic, Connecticut for the kids (more images below – bottom of this piece)! From there, plans shifted a bit – as a request to help a family with a Lead-poisoned child in Maryland came in, so we headed towards Maryland.

Continue reading below the images
(my four sons’ last moments together before we headed on our way!)

…and then the car broke down!

Just a bit north of Hartford, Connecticut (on the way to Maryland) the car broke down, and we had it towed to a local Fiat dealer (thank G-d for AAA!) The prognosis is grim, however… after a thorough exam by a qualified Fiat mechanic, we learned that little-red-car is now pretty much irreparable [the astronomical cost for the major engine work ($4,000!), or the recommended option, of “‘dropping’ a brand-new engine in” ($8,000!) is utterly prohibitive!].

I am now faced with making a big decision — and letting the service folks (where I left it) know what I want to do with the car (I told them I would be in touch by Tuesday). At this point, it looks like I am going to ask them if perhaps they might want to buy my beloved little car for parts – or if they know anyone who will buy it for parts [and if there is no-one to buy it for parts, I guess I may have no other choice but to pay to have it towed to a junk yard! – because paying $8,000+ for a new engine (or $4,000+ for a non-guaranteed repair) on a 10-year-old car with 91,000 miles makes no sense!]

Because I needed to continue onward to help the family in Maryland, I left my broken-down car at the auto-shop that examined it and rented a car. We transferred everything to the rental car except the kayaks — which we left at the mechanics, because we had no way to carry them in the rental car! And then a friend from high school who happens to live in Hartford picked up our kayaks to temporarily re-home them!

Car as it was being towed the last / final time.
Continue reading below the image:

Kids with the temporary rental car the day the car broke down
(continue reading below the image).

Revisiting the idea of acquiring a new, improved Lead Safe Mama mobile as a possible solution to the current conundrum…

Solving the puzzle now includes figuring out how to either continue our journey (using a rental car or other alternate vehicle) or give up and fly home early and regroup. In a magical perfect world there would be a “Deus Ex Machina”…and a new/replacement Lead Safe Mama mobile (with a good working engine and all the other parts working, too) would fall in my lap (but not literally — ouch!)!

If you have been following my work for years, you know that a PROPER (appropriate & reliable) Lead-Safe-Mama-Mobile has been a dream – and a formal objective – for quite some time now. The intention behind this vehicle (if I were to acquire the ideal vehicle) would be to have a robust, reliable form of transportation that I could use to tour the country periodically — for a month or more at a time (three or four times a year each year – as I I am doing at the moment, and have begun doing every year for several years, now), helping families of Lead poisoned children along the way. Here’s a link to an article I wrote a while ago about my DREAM Lead-Safe-Mama-Mobile.

I wrote this today because my husband suggested that now might be a good time to re-share about my dream Lead-Safe-Mama-Mobile — just in case someone somewhere out there might miraculously be able to help make that happen in the next week or so(!), so I can continue on my journey already in progress (as it was with us in the Fiat).

Perhaps someone has a vehicle like my dream Lead-Safe-Mama-Mobile that they aren’t using, or have been thinking about re-homeing?
Perhaps someone wants to make an investment in the work I do, by helping us to purchase this vehicle now (to be re-paid over time, with income generated through the outreach work and events done with the help of an appropriate vehicle!)
Perhaps someone has another creative solution??

Why do you want to be on the road so much, Tamara (it sounds exhausting!)??

I love this work. I am also the only one currently doing this work in this way. There are families in crisis everywhere who need my help — families with children with “mysterious” / unexplained persistent sources of Lead exposure. In most cases I am working with families after local health agencies and hazards assessors have been unable to track down an exposure source. Sometimes the health departments have even referred the families to me to help them solve these mysteries. I appreciate the opportunity to help these families solve these mysteries and protect their children.

Thanks in advance for any advice or resources you have to offer (about my current vehicular conundrum)— I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have you folks to bounce things off of at times like these.

Tamara