I agree, to a point. I think a lot of their stress comes from the fear of being inadequate to the task of providing even the basics. I noticed on cable that so many shows deal with survival [...] Mainly fundamental skills [...] At first I was skeptical of those shows, but now I'm glad for them. If nothing else, a couple of them might provide some insight to just why folks like us are how we are, and perhaps awaken some latent desire that will at least convince them we aren't crazy hermits crawling out from under a rock [...] We like what works, what we can fix if it breaks, what will endure in a pinch, or knowing a half-dozen ways to get the job done.
That's right. I watch a good deal of homesteading vids on Youtube, and a fair portion of them - probably the lion's share, are folks checking out of society, and aiming for a simpler life. I admire that they have chosen that way.
As an aside (to this aside), it is funny to me that the knowledge those folks are set on recovering (and largely succeeding in doing so) comes mainly from two types: Old farmers and hillbillies, the continuity handed down over generations, and old hippies who checked out of the free love movement and actually learned to practice what so many back then preached.
Another set of Youtubers are doing what is called 'bushcrafting' nowadays (what you and I know as woodsmanship) ... And it is capturing the attention of youths in leaps and bounds, to include my nephew. It has been a comfort to me, as he and I have not had much in common until now, and my illness prevented me from teaching (or rather demonstrating) those skills to my own kids... It's kinda nice when he and his friends come over just to hear me carry on about my travels in the woods, teaching them things they have picked up, but don't quite understand... He's come a long way since he first walked off with his blue K-mart tarp and his Rambo knife. :)
But there really ain't that many by comparison. The vast majority are either like I was, too busy grinding off my nose to worry about it, or so dependent or high as to not even desire anything more. They come a'runnin' to it like goats to the rattle of a feed bucket.
That doesn't mean we shun technology (I am writing this on the internet, on a computer, but that we aren't beholden to it as its slaves, nor beholden to the opinions of people we have never met that we know to be either fundamentally incorrect, or just not applicable to our circumstances.
That's right. If I ain't got electricity, I don't mind. I have been on kerosene lamps before. That ain't quite true - I have a fridge and a freezer whose contents I would have to protect (that's what the generator is for), but even that will not govern me soon... I am going back to pre-electric methods for food preservation, and soon enough, the fridge and freezer won't matter either.
We don't expend as much energy fighting nature (by constructing artificial worlds increasingly reliant on technologies with multiple potential points of failure), but rather spend our energies just getting along with nature, and trying to make the most of the blessings in front of us.
That's right. And the more one gets away from those technologies and their potential points of failure, the easier one's mind becomes. It's a different outlook and a different lifestyle that you just can't even comprehend as a gerbil on the wheel. I know. I was there. And I should have known better.
Some folks will never understand that, they are too wed to their artfully crafted world, and that's okay as long as they do not seek to impose that on the rest of us. There is plenty of room for those microcosms, as long as they don't try to force us in.
Ironically, this is the 'diversity' they should crow about.
Brings to mind
@Cripplecreek 's sister, and my own, who are addlepated that someone can be content without the city, and even shun all it has to offer. I understand CC perfectly (and I am much the same). All that shiny, bouncy crap never did turn me on all that much. And his sister is no doubt much like my own, who is dead set on making me like it, dammit, or there is something wrong with my brain chemistry. She intends to fix my redneck sensibilities with 'medicine'... It makes me laugh out loud. I find my peace and pleasure in the natural habitat of a hoomin bean - the forest, creek, and river, and I'm the one who is broken?
There may be an envy factor as well, because the difference in the stresses of a fundamental existence are so basic, instinctive even, and, well, less, that those living within the ever-changing construct deal with artificial stress which increases the higher their status, although those well adapted to that environment probably don't even notice.Yep.
It is a caution. The whole of society is dead set on preserving itself, to the point of insanity. Not too far back, I was openly laughed at for yearning for Mayberry RFD - And told that Mayberry is a myth. It is so very far removed nowadays, from people's minds, that they cannot even conceive of a simpler time... A better way.
But I remember Mayberry. I remember never locking the truck (with rifles hanging in the rack, no less), never taking the keys out of it... And if it wasn't where you put it when you come out, you'd just look for where someone moved it because it was in the way... And sure enough, there it would be.
And I am going back to that, I surely am. It may be all but dying, but I am going there to fan the flame and feed the fire. Enough of this damnable rat race. I may die poor by the world's standard, but I will die happy, and in my mind a wealthy man.
