The Digital Homesteader (Beta)

They say that the longest journey begins by taking the first step.  I subscribe to that. But I also see that if I have taken that first step I am then farther than those who don’t take a step.  And in homesteading that is a big part of it. We need to push ourselves just a little at times to make sure that we are in the right direction. So,  each Friday I will post what that step was for me this week and you can share as well (in the comments).

Wheat! I drove to an Amish bulk store on the Kentucky/Tennessee border and got 150 pounds of wheat. It looks like a lot when we load it in the car, but I know that it won’t last that long. We use a lot of wheat at our home, and buying it in bulk really saves us. We paid about $85 (a LOT more expensive than last year) which works out to be 53 cents a pound.  That should keep us in fresh bread for about 6 months.

I love looking at differenct cultures and learning. One of the things that strikes me every time is that the American culture is so used to our luxuries that we can’t possibly conceive of the idea of “going without”. But cultures that have never experienced these luxuries, or have eschewed them, don’t seem to be missing out at all. Now please don’t misunderstand, I am not saying that we need to sell everything that we have and join some primative community. I am saying that we can learn from them and possibly adapt some of our ways. Personally, I like have a toilet inside the house and plan to keep it.

All around us are people that have made conscious decisions not to have one convenience or another for a variety of reasons.  During the Great Depression people found that they had to cut back on a lot of things and make due. Wouldn’t it be a great practice to do so now? We have found that we don’t need the TV (shock!), we can get by without the phone.  I asked the family recently what they would have the hardest time giving up and the consensus is that we wouldn’t do well without air conditioning. That’s a tough one, but so many people for so many centuries have done fine without it. We have become spoiled.

I want to recommend a great fiction peice that I had never read until this past week although it is famous and has been out for 50 years. “Alas, Babylon” by Pat Frank. The premise is that there are a lot of nuclear bombs that fall on America and how the city of Fort Repose, FL adjusts to life after the bombs. It is very similar to the TV series Jericho in a lot of aspects, just in a different era.  It really got me thinking a lot about the value of what we have and some of the things that I would like to trade if we ever had need.  I don’t particularly think that a nuclear war is a significant threat today, but the priciples of what these people had to do to survive was compelling. Shelter, water, and food; everything else is secondary.