In the Static, A Spark
Hi, I’m DamagedOwl.
This whole thing started with a question:
How do you make a living while living full-time in a 40' motorhome?
My husband and I sold our house, left our quiet Midwest town behind, and hit the road with two cats and about 350 sq ft of space — which sounds bigger than it feels when you’ve got a shopping habit and a lifetime of “but I might need this later” clutter to sort through.
Downsizing from 2,000 sq ft was an emotional event. I had to figure out what actually mattered — and spoiler: I didn’t always guess right. But we made it work. We've been at this about eight months now, and it’s been... a ride. We’ve learned a lot — including the horror of the dreaded RV “TP pyramid.” (If you know, you know.)
From Stability to Static
We had kids young. I spent most of those years as a stay-at-home mom, which means I didn’t rack up much “real-world” job experience. I helped run my husband’s company for a while, but when it folded about six months ago, I was kind of left... floating.
It felt like static — and for the first time in decades, I didn’t have a clear purpose. Just space. And that’s scary when you’ve always been on duty.
While my husband picked up delivery gigs, I started chasing remote work. I tried everything — even those sketchy apps that promise you’ll earn hundreds just by playing mobile games. (Spoiler again: you won’t.) I also realized — mid-30s and humbled — that I never really learned how to type. Which is wildly inconvenient when every job wants 80 WPM and five years of experience in things you’ve never heard of.
Enter: AI and Coloring Books?
Eventually, I stumbled across videos of people making money selling coloring books. And I thought — that actually sounds... kind of amazing. Most were using AI to generate pages, so I gave it a shot.
The results? Kind of cursed. The images looked great — until you actually looked at them. Editing them was more pain than payoff, and I couldn’t bring myself to sell something I wasn’t proud of.
But still — something about the process lit up that old creative part of my brain.
The Space Between
As a kid, I was always drawing, always dreaming. I wanted to write, to make things — obsessively creative but paralyzed by perfectionism. Art class was the only place I could breathe. English felt like decoding alien signals. (Thank goodness for spellcheck.)
And now? I’m here. Writing a blog. Making weird little things. Learning to type properly in my thirties.
I’m awkward. I overthink everything. I usually want to leave social situations before they start. But this? This blog feels different.
It feels like a quiet room in the back of my brain — a place to figure things out and maybe connect with a few weird, wonderful people who feel the same.
