Starting it all over...

I grew up living the lifestyle you dream about in the 70's and 80's as a child. It sucked!!! Raising pigs as a kid, shoveling their $hit, cleaning pens, washing them, feeding them, castrating them. Bucked bails and filled barns up with hay as well. IT SUCKED!!!!

Then I grew up and have two careers. Timber falling after high school, and then on to underground hardrock mining.

Tell you what. Go fall timber all summer or go underground and hold on to an ass-end of an jackleg drill for 10-12 hours a day and tell me how that old timely lifestyle feels.

I've had enough old timey hard work style lifestyles to last me 3 lifetimes. That kind of hard living, bust your a$$ only to make an old man out of you lifestyle is nothing I'd wish on anyone. Not even one of them there Taliwackers in the Taliban.
 
There are some communities based on this model, but a lot of them either mix in "mother nature bush hippie crap" (to quote Dave Canterbury) or are organized as a commune.

I've often thought it would be great to find one of those small towns in the Midwest that are being abandoned by the modern generations and go start up some sort of business/factory that could sustain 25-50 families. That'd be enough to also need a dozen or so farmers, a teacher, a doctor/NP, a mechanic, and the other skilled trades. It'd be more like Little House on the Prairie rather than Amish Light, but there would still be the internet, UPS, modern healthcare, etc. Best of both worlds, in my opinion.
 
michaelmcgo said:
Don't confuse my thead with a return to nature thread. I am not suggesting a dirrect return to caveman lifestyle, but instead a lifestyle shift
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Fair enough. I just gathered from your original post that you were speaking more in terms of societal breakdown, etc., because you stated your understanding "that something terrible would have to happen" and the resultant "drawbacks such as a shortened life span, increase in disease, difficult child birth, etc."

I dig where you are coming from. I think that many of us share the desire to be more self-reliant and to remove ourselves from much of the hogwash that we see in the world. We grow weary of Lindsay Lohan, the Facebook culture, and an hour special on ESPN to announce Labron James' decision. To some degree we believe that raising our own food, building our homes, etc. makes us less dependent on a food supply or a culture which we see as declining and fraught with risk. There is some truth to that.

The flip side, though, is that we are probably much less likely to live a long and healthy life by living off the grid, so to speak.

As for the lifestyle change, Mrs. Powernoodle gave up the practice of law after 10 years in a big firm with a promising future for this very reason. We are not exactly living off the land, but its a step in the direction of prioritizing one's life. I work from home for the sole reason that it allows me to spend time with the Powernoodle Juniors. This is not caveman living, but a recognition of the brevity of life and those things which are meaningful while we are here.

I think there is a balance out there for each of us, located somewhere between living off the grid in the woods with long toenails and body odor, and the contemporary suburban culture. A prioritization of what is important, with the best of both worlds. For me, that would be 20 acres outside of town. Far enough away that I could raise a big garden in peace, and close enough for an ambulance to find me.
 
I love my Intarwebs too much to give them up for more than a week or so at a time, so I'll stay tied to society for now. I think I'd have more trouble weaseling money out of you guys via mail order.

I would, however, like to live in a remote area with at least 100 acres of my own, maybe 20 miles outside of a small to mid size city. My brother owns a couple of construction companies, one of which focuses on green and self sustaining technologies, so I have most of the stuff figured out. The only one I can't seem to figure out how to stay off the grid for is Internet. Satellite's upload speed sucks or requires a phone line. I'm hoping WiMax grows and matures in leaps and bounds over the next 5-10 years so I can take my wife and be the crazy couple in the mountains.

Regarding food, Wired magazine had a really good writeup about building various size gardens, including ones with protein sources, in a recent issue.
 
Say if I ever became financially ruined and homeless, I've contemplated I would just move to the mountains or something and just live off the land. I would rather survive in the wild than on the filthy streets. My fiancee says she'd do the same, so at least I wouldn't be alone. It wouldn't have to mean the breakdown of civilization for something like this to happen either...it could happen to pretty much anyone at any point in life.
 
michaelmcgo said:
Don't confuse my thead with a return to nature thread. I am not suggesting a dirrect return to caveman lifestyle, but instead a lifestyle shift to providing for my family with my hands and having neighbors who are not afraid to talk to me.
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Just move to Idaho... places like that still exist. I know alot of people here in Boise that grow supplemental vegitable gardens in their back yard-two 10 foot by 2 foot box gardens in the back yard of onions carrots potatoes chives radishes etc and you'll rarely if ever have to buy vegitables again. Outside of farming/ranching/mining/vacationing communities of a hundred people scattered here and there, Boise and a few towns, our population is largely that of simple cattle ranching and farming. Very comfortable and rewarding mountain lifestyle, and it shows amongst the general populace-people are extremely nice here because they know how to enjoy life. I've never seen anywhere quite like it anywhere else in the country. Having enough personal space has a lot to do with it, as well. 1.4 million people in a state this big...
 
Nearly every day I think about selling everything except what will fit into a pack and heading off to the woods for good. Maybe one day I'll act upon it.
 
True contentment can not exist without a relationship with the God who created you. Read the Bible. Start with the book of John.
 
Brother I praise God for you m, I was feeling the lord calling me to say the same thing. So sence you heard first I'll just second what you said.

Also I have been feeling a little of the way the op was feeling, but then remembered that this life is only for a time. What will happen after that?
 
We'll all wake up simultaneously in a river valley that is millions of miles long populated with every person ever born since the dawn of man.
 
What killed the 70's back to the landers and will still do in anyone looking to live a self-sufficient cash free live style is property taxes. You don't own land, you rent it from the government. The second you can't pay the taxes to support all those urban problems you thought were escaping from, out you go. And as I found out as a farm kid many years ago, all city people think you are rich if you own more than lot for a house. Which means you must be forced to pay your "fair share' to support modern society.

Insufficient cash income means no life on the land in short order.
 
There's a few books I've read lately about self reliance and wilderness living-The Wilderness Cabin, 5 Acres and Independance and the 50 Dollar Underground House, all of which have me very interested as to how well (even modern) you can live on residences constructed by yourself that are completely off grid-no water, power or gas lines.
 
Sidehill Gouger said:
What killed the 70's back to the landers and will still do in anyone looking to live a self-sufficient cash free live style is property taxes. You don't own land, you rent it from the government. The second you can't pay the taxes to support all those urban problems you thought were escaping from, out you go. And as I found out as a farm kid many years ago, all city people think you are rich if you own more than lot for a house. Which means you must be forced to pay your "fair share' to support modern society.

Insufficient cash income means no life on the land in short order.
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Well, they have a short article on differences between the 70's back to the landers, how people make money with their new lifestyle, and living more of a back to the land lifestyle, but staying in society while you do it.

It's not about being a long-haired, smelly hippy anymore.
 
I think I understand what you mean. I used to live in a small town in a farming county to the west of me. I liked having modern conveniences available...but I liked having my garden and my workshop to go to after work. I made most of my oldest daughter's first "furniture" and some of her toys. I also liked actually knowing all of my neighbors (even if there were some I didn't care much for) as well as knowing the owners of all the local stores and addressing them on a first name basis. I liked the mix of things...I really miss that place some times.

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Thanks Birdkiller, just saying what I know from the heart. If you really seek the truth, He will find you, and you will never be the same again!
 
Amen brother!

Not to hijack this thread so, I like to hunt and that helps fill up the out door needs. But I had a surgery and can't walk for 6 more months so I'll be doing lots of dreaming.
 
Just my opinion (don't take it personally) but... Nature needs no religion, nor God....it exists on it's own, quite naturally. There is more "truth" to be found in nature than in any book bound my Man. Nature doesn't lie.

I guess some people would go out to the wilderness to be "closer to God"...I go there to get away from all the man-made rubbish and to be closer to nature.

Perhaps religion/spirituality is not so off-topic as far as living alone in the wild is concerned, for if a man is to truly survive in the wild, he must have some level of faith, and a strong spirit indeed.








:D
 
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The man-made crap is the concrete jungle.

There's no conflict to want to go out into nature to be closer to the one that created it.
 
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