Back the landers - Part 2: Mad at the millennium.
No, that is not some Hollywood blockbuster title, but it is a growing resurgence in something that began in the '60s and '70s with many young people rejecting the affluent fable of finding happiness in their efforts to make as much money as they could to buy things that may be able to fill a deepening void.
"If you build the tower of Babel high enough, surely you will reach heaven. So, we build 100 storey buildings in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles hoping to get to heaven that way," said Scott Nearing with a chuckle. Scott and his wife Helen are attributed great weight in the back to the land movement as the counter culture of the '60-'70s read Scott's book on "the good life."
Scott was a radical economist born in 1883 and died in 1983 living to be 100 years old on his homestead with his wife Helen. Scott was a professor for some time on economics but later was relieved of his position because of his disdain for capitalism, which seemed a threat to government.
In a country where at the time everyone was in a "red scare," Scott and his wife were blacklisted and had their mail read regularly by government.
I began reading a book by Mellissa Coleman recently. She is the daughter of Elliot and Sue Coleman. Elliot and Sue are touted as being extremely influential in the organic farming movement (particularly growing in cold climates) and were disciples, you could say, of Scott and Helen. In Melissa's book, she describes the thrift and grit to which their family went through to create their lifestyle and self-sufficient income. I can't help but chuckle and cringe as I read the book as the similarities are uncanny.
As our technology changes and moves forward with lightning speed and our culture tags along like one of those children you see at the mall with a rope attached to them and their parents, I can tell you it gets increasingly difficult to get off the boat and attempt to live this good life.
These days, you must advertise the benefits of eating healthy vegetables to combat the advertisers of simple quick fast food, and you must use the internet's big brother known as Facebook to do so as this is now the majority of people's communication and, unfortunately, news. This simple fact means we must also partake in a bit of this cultural phenomenon of faceless communication.
But despite our need to have a technological umbilical cord to help aid in our financial needs, we are no doubt living "the good life." Which to Janie and I is not a life of conspicuous consumption but that of having our basic needs met and knowing that despite any worldly issues we have our food, shelter and winter fuel and we have acquired this by our own hands. I often joke that our pantry, root cellar and wood shed is our bank account.
As I have no doubt started to become a bit of a voice on "living the good life" and organic agriculture in the region, I have had many new entrants to the homesteading/farming world come to me asking a multitude of questions from what to do with your pigs when they are doing this and how to what is the easiest thing I can do in farming that will make money (short answer to the last one is...nothing).
In the past few years I have started consulting some new homesteaders on ways to improve their situation on their homestead and even searching out homesteading properties for individuals and creating a custom plan for them based on climate, topography and soil to aid in their quest. This aids in my town bank account and saves many from making the mistakes that often causes new farmers to give up which can be far costlier than one of my consultations.
After I had left university and moved to Alaska on my own dream of homesteading, I am ultimately thankful for meeting a beautiful French-Canadian who changed my plans and became my wife. I was on a mission of saving money and purchasing remote land in Alaska to homestead in my early twenties.
If I had gone to the forest and began this adventure at that time, thinking I knew enough to do well from my agriculture degree, I certainly would have failed and possibly failed in a large and dangerous way.
While I often say, "failure is how I know what I know" when asked how did I learn the things I know now in regards to my lifestyle and business. I have learned some from others and I am fortunate enough to be too stubborn to give in when times get tough. My mother often had said that each time I wanted something, I put my horse blinders on and just kept trotting in that direction. She may be right but I would recommend taking your blinders off occasionally to have a look around.
I am always as happy as a puppy at feeding time when new farmers come to me to discuss their dreams. From our discussions, I get to live out that extremely exciting stage of the beginning, vicariously.
The conclusion to this long article is, "living the good life" is possible. No, it is not easy and never will be, but neither is working away all year to have a two-week vacation somewhere before you head back to the slave pen. Choose a life that is as enjoyable as a vacation year-round.
