poverty or abundance?

[nodak3]

Just a quick question--how many of ya'll homestead because you love the lifestyle, and how many of you do it because of poverty or economic concerns? Second quick question--do you generally see life as a feast to choose from, or subscribe to the "life is tough and then you die" mindset?

[Maura]

In answer to your survey:

1. Although we can live more economically here than in the city on the surface, our wages are lower, so it evens out. Regardless of wages, we would live in the country. Even if I didn't want livestock or a big garden or pond, I love the peace and quiet.

2. I'm somewhere in between. You have to make the best with what you have, materially, physically, and spiritually. You get to decide every day if you are going to be dragged down by the world or lifted up.

[mtman]

Originally Posted by nodak3

Just a quick question--how many of ya'll homestead because you love the lifestyle, and how many of you do it because of poverty or economic concerns? Second quick question--do you generally see life as a feast to choose from, or subscribe to the "life is tough and then you die" mindset?

well forshure you will die and life is tuff but in my eyes with some hard work life can be a feast imho a feast is many things to differant people


jim

[whiterock]

I grew up in the country and I am not comfortable in town. I actually have a physical/emotional need to plant and harvest and to be around some livestock.

As for the other, the older I get the more I want to enjoy life. Good food, good friends, good conversation, a good bed, comfortable chair, front porch, and grandchildren, those are the things I enjoy now more than before.

Life is tough but it is a journey to be lived and experienced.

[NWSneaky]

I spent twenty-years in Kansas City and tried and tried to get to the country the entire time. I don't consider myself a homesteader. I spent a lot of time and work building up hundreds of acres, hogs, cattle and dairy. Now I enjoy my good house in the country, 80 acres and NO HASSLES. I suppose I am a recluse. I like people but I don't want to be around anyone. Good dogs, horses, kids and my adult son is plenty good enough for me.

[Kygardengal]

I am a homesteader because it is the only lifestyle that comes close to
bringing me any kind of happiness. I take great pleasure in all aspects of
self-sufficiency. I am just a "do it yourselfer" kind of person. I love the independence and control it provides for my life. Life is definately a feast to
me. Not that it has been easy, but still a feast. I get great rewards from the
simple things.

[Sparkey]

"well forshure you will die and life is tuff but in my eyes with some hard work life can be a feast imho a feast is many things to differant people."


.......MTMN, and imho ya got it right on the button !

[countribound]

1. Funny you ask. We have made a decision to give up our abundant lifestyle in the city to homestead, and gain abundance in another sense. Maybe we will think about that later, but right now it seems like a better trade.
2. Life is definitely what you make of it. I feel that if you are content and grateful with what the Lord has given you, you will always feel as if you are feasting.

Just my two cents.

[nodak3]

Thanks all! You reaffirmed my basic take on life, that life is a feast of wonderment and just getting better. Seems with one or two exceptions, everywhere I have turned lately the homesteader type and rural type are complaining how the culture, the world, and life in general are just so goshawful hard. I've been wanting to get up on a soapbox and holler "in comparison to what?" Not life in the USA in east Texas in the 30's. Or s. e. NM in the early 50's. Or most of the world, for that matter. Thanks again--I needed to hear an optimistic note!

[Elizabeth]

Glad you posted this thread, cause I have been thinking a lot about this subject lately. 9 months ago I married a man whom I met here on the forum, and what a great joy to finally have someone to share my frugal homesteading lifestyle with. We are not poor. We are in our mid-40's and are both "mostly" retired, other than some part-time farming and beekeeping. This was our choice. We wanted time to spend together, to relax and enjoy our life together here on the farm, and that is much more important than running off to jobs every day and coming home too tired to enjoy each other at the end of the day.

Did you ever hear the song by the group "Alabama" (can't remember the title right now), which includes the line-
"Somebody told us Wall Street fell, but we were so poor that we couldn't tell"? I always understood that line in theory, and have heard the same sentiment echoed by older people who lived on farms during the Depression, but now I am experiencing a similar scenario, albeit without the poverty. Living here, we are just starting to garden together and raise chickens and rabbits for meat and eggs. My husband raises organic grain and hay and he also hunts. We have two freezers out in the barn and they are always full. We have a veritable bounty of food here- we have beef, moose, deer, turkey, fish, chicken, and rabbit in the freezers- maybe some ducks, too, I'm not sure about them. We won't even raise a steer for a while to come because we are going to get some lambs, feeder pigs, and goats for meat, plus we will hunt again this year for more deer, pheasant, etc. We have traded eggs for raw cow's milk and raw goat's milk, we trade honey from our bees for other items, and we are really getting into bartering whenever the opportunity arises.

We have cash for the things we need, and can afford to indulge ourselves on occassion with things that we just "want", but we find that more and more, our needs and many of our wants can be satisfied by shopping at Goodwill and/or garage sales. There just isn't that much that we need anymore, and as we move towards producing more of our own food, and feed for the livestock we raise, the number of items we have to purchase at retail is diminishing. Our entertainment is found mostly at home, or with family members who live nearby.

I often find myself wondering how so many Americans are in such dire financial straits that they cannot even put food on the family's table. We are surrounded by an abundant harvest. It makes me think that many more people should be moving back to the farms and countryside, where at least they could feed their families on good, fresh, healthy homegrown food.

[Bill in Tn]

Originally Posted by nodak3

Just a quick question--how many of ya'll homestead because you love the lifestyle, and how many of you do it because of poverty or economic concerns? Second quick question--do you generally see life as a feast to choose from, or subscribe to the "life is tough and then you die" mindset?

To me life is an unending feast. Every morning, when I go out to take of the livestock, I stand and look around me at this marvellous world. I wonder how it can be that I am allowed to live in this wonderful country, at this time of abundence and prosperity. My wife and I speak of this often. We both remember an earlier time when this was not the case.
It is very hard to understand why so many people are filled with hatred and rancor toward their own country, and the system that makes all of this possible. People come here from other countries and can't believe that so many of us don't take advantage of the opportunity to better ourselves. Choosing instead a life of self-indulgenge and victimhood, expecting someone else to make their life better. Let's do it ourselves.

[Mid Tn Mama]

We are living this lifestyle by choice. Although now that our wages are not what they were in the city, it sure helps to be self sufficient. What this lifestyle allows us to do is to work together at building something that you see the results of--as opposed to the work you do for someone else. When we go to bed entirely exhausted, it's a very happy exhausted. I think we are happier and less stressed than before.

We believe that everything we have been given is only by the grace of God. We try to be good stewards of that--to help those less fortunate than us and to try not to waste it selfishly.

[Mid Tn Mama]

And one other thing. I remember seeing this HGTV show where these people created a beautiful home and property and they said that they no longer travelled like they used to because there wasn't a hotel or bed and breakfast as nice as their home.

Our place isn't like that show, but to us it is getting to be that way. Once we get the landscaping in more, we will feel like vacationing here (and not find ourselves wanting to dig holes, plant shrubs on vacation ha,ha). I am creating our bed and breakfast that is cozy and homey and filled with yard sale antiques. The outside is filled with a bountiful veggie garden and flowering bushes and flowers of every kind.

[shadowwalker]

We are going to do this until we win the lottery. Then I'm going to get into farming BIGTIME!!!! Then I'm going to be a racecar driver. Then I'm going to be a helecopter pilot. Then I'm going to buy a mountain and live on it-above the farm. Then I'm going to buy a house in ALASKA. Then I'm going to.....................shadowwalker

[Ravenlost]

We live in the country because I grew up a farmgirl and it seems to be ingrained. I'm happiest off the beaten path...away from people and noise and hassle. I prefer the hassle of country life - tater bugs eating my garden plants, chickens eating the tater bugs I hand feed them, etc. We gave up the easy shopping and nightly restaurant meals in Dallas/Ft. Worth for life in the country and we couldn't be happier. Had nothing to do with income.

As for my philosophy on life...I believe that life is hard and you have to do the best you can to survive it as gracefully as possible.

[Angharad]

I'm just doing this 'cause it feels right. Grew up on 40 acres of pure clay and never was as self-sufficent as I could have been. Living in the city now but with a big garden (7200 square feet) about 20 minutes away.

I can and preserve because it feels right and I like knowing where my food has been....

Angharad

[okgoatgal2]

because it is how i feel drawn to live....crowds bother me, nosy people bother me, and i prefer to raise my children outside of the crowded environment....raising my own foods and being as self-sufficient as i can be is important to my mental well-being.

[sisterpine]

it definitely is not less expensive for me to live on this mountain. gas to town costs a fortune. chichen feed is also pricy, utilities (home made of course) are expensive too. but when i wake in the morning to the crow of the roo and look outside seeing all of the world it seems you could not pay me enough to go back to the city. i still must go to town for work for a few years but that is ok, cause i get to come back to the mountain each night! better poor than crowded...i just dont like people that much.

[LiberalCountryBoy]

Crappy economy and crappy people sent me searchin for the country.
Even out here they'll ask you why aren't you doing something that you have a degree for. (Degree I'm Still paying for) Here is my answer:
People suck! They always let you down. The less interaction with other humans, the better. Everybody is soo freakin greedy. 'Greed is good' is like a new national motto. I just don't fit in

[HunterTed]

I choose the country lifestyle because farming and raising livestock is a family tradition handed down from generation to generation in both my and my wifes famlies. Unfortunately in my family I am the only one out of 6 grandchildren that continues the farming tradition. Everyone else in my generation chooses to live in the big city in fancy houses, and drive fancy cars. Now my wifes family is a different story. Everyone in her generation still has something to do with farming and even their kids are involved in it. I guess that is why I get along better with them than I do with my own family. We all raise something to contribute to the whole family. Not just our immediate famlies. for instance....I am the only one that deer hunts, but everyone eats deer meat that I give them. An uncle and aunt grow corn so we all have plenty to eat all year long. In fact last year my wife and I put up 200 ears just for me and her. Whenever I butcher goats or rabbits, everybody pitches in and everybody goes home with fresh meat. I think that this is the way life should be. People that look in at my life from the outside cannot seem to understand why I live the way that I do. And I cannot see how they can stand to live in the city around all those people. Different strokes for different folks. But they will be singing a different tune if we ever go into another depression and they cannot afford food while I can go right outside and get whatever I want to eat. Being pretty much self sufficient is a GREAT way of life if you ask me.