Life off of the grid

It really isn’t a crazy idea.  Living off of the land is something that was done, by everyone, up until the last 100 years or so.  I am not an extreme conspiracy theorist.  But you have to wonder, with what is going on in our world, what could happen.  Could we be looking at World War III in our lifetime?  What if what happened on September 11, 2001 happened on our soil again on a larger scale?  What if ISIS ups their game and hits somewhere on our soil, close to where you or I live?  It is a scary thought.

I want to be prepared to be able to live in a place where the only person I have to rely on is myself and my husband.  Now I am not some doomsday prepper.  I don’t want to be a recluse.  It is simply that thinking of what “could” happen has made me realize how dependent we are on society for basically everything.  From the food we eat to the fuel that powers our vehicles to the electricity that is currently powering this laptop.

Looking back 100 years ago, or even 50 years ago, there was a sense of community.  People helped each other.  People knew their neighbors.  By name, not just someone you waved at when you were rushing out to your car to go to your job so you can try to keep up with your neighbors financially.  I never really knew what that was like.  My grandparents did, and my parents did to an extent, but I haven’t really experienced that.  I want that.  I want to experience what a true community feels like.  I want to be able to help my neighbor and know that my neighbor will be there to help me if needed.

For a while now my husband and I have been looking into a more simple life.  This is what we want.  It will take planning.  There are a lot of things we will need to learn.  But there are a lot of things that we already know since we grew up in the mountains.  Then one day I was on Facebook and ran across a non-profit page. Colorado Eco Village.  You should check this page out.  It was like a sign.  I read about what they were hoping to accomplish and realized that it was exactly what we were wanting to do.  But then you think to yourself, do I really want to do this with someone I don’t know?  Kinda strange, right? And do you want to know the best part?  The guy actually has some knowledge and has a thought out plan.  But of course he does, he happens to be my cousin. 🙂  So yes, we really want to do this.

Again, this isn’t something that will happen overnight or even this year.  Well, as far as my husband and I moving up there.  But it is something that is in the works.  He is looking at land right now for the Eco Village and he will make it happen.  And we will do our part when and where we can in the mean time.  The more people learn about it, the faster it can happen.  It only takes one person to make a difference.

Do you ever look around and all you see are people with their noses in their electronics?  I know that is odd because if it wasn’t for electronics, I wouldn’t be writing this and you wouldn’t be reading this.  I sometimes sit and think that it would be so nice if we weren’t SO dependent on them.

Growing up in Southern Colorado, we didn’t have a lot of money.  We moved from Texas and didn’t have the first clue about living in the mountains.  We moved there in August and that Thanksgiving we received 46 inches of snow in 48 hours. We were probably in over our heads, but we were going to make a go of living there.

The first year that we moved there we didn’t even have electricity or running water.  Hard to believe that was in 1981 and electricity and water were common.  I mean it was 1981 not 1881.  We had to haul water from town for cooking and bathing.  We had to do our laundry in town and then haul it home.  The road to our house was not a county maintained road, so during the winter we would have to walk a mile to get to the highway where the car was parked or to meet the school bus and then walk it again at the end of the day to get home.  We were able to put in a septic tank before winter hit, but because we had to haul water, you did not flush it every time you used the restroom.  You waited until it was pretty full and this was before “composting” toilets were a “thing”.  It was basically like using an outhouse but indoors.  My brother and I did our homework using a kerosene lamp.  I still contend that the eye strain of doing that is the reason that I needed glasses in 6th grade.

The first summer we were there, which was the summer of 1982, we were able to put a well in.  It was so exciting to be able to flush the toilet and actually take a bath without having to heat up the water on the stove!  Or in the case of the winter, having to melt the snow on the stove to take a bath.  Getting a well was a BIG deal.

Because we were basically poor, my dad started hunting.  That is one of the ways that we acquired our meat.  We never had a garden.  I think that had more to do with the fact that both of my parents worked and most of our soil was shale which is not great for gardening.  But we learned how to live frugally.  We didn’t have what we wanted, but we had what we needed.  The basics.  A roof over our head, wood to keep the stove going and the house warm and food in our bellies.

Looking back at that time in my life it is a love/hate relationship.  I loved where we lived.  It remains one of the most beautiful places I have ever been and I have been to all of the lower 48 states.  My husband still has family there and we go visit when we can.  I hated it because being a kid and being poor is hard.  Kids would make fun of me when I couldn’t wash my hair every day or make fun of my clothes because we couldn’t afford what was in fashion.  Girls can be very cruel sometimes.  So like I said, it was a love/hate relationship.

Now that I am older, and hopefully a little wiser, I can look back and see what it taught me about life and about myself.  I have a strong work ethic because I started working when I was 13.  If I wanted something, I had to work for it.  Literally.  Nothing in life comes easy, but it is worth it if you work for it.  When you work for something you really appreciate it more.  I learned that if you tell me I can’t do something, I WILL prove you wrong.  And lastly, I learned to be a genuinely nice person.  I remember how it feels to be on the receiving end of the mean girls making snide comments behind your back and to your face.  I will NEVER treat anyone the way that I was treated and I think I did a good job of raising our kids so that they don’t treat people that way.

My husband and I met in High School in the same small town in Southern Colorado and he had a similar childhood to mine.  We have always wanted to go back to Colorado, which we consider home, but life has a way of getting in the way.  We had children to consider and now we have grandchildren to consider.  But if you are always considering other people, then YOU will never get to do what YOU want.  We are at an age where we have decided we are going to do something for ourselves.

We are going back to the basics.

No more trying to keep up with the Jones’. No more needless spending on things we don’t need.  This isn’t going to happen over night.  This is going to be a several year process.  We have things that are going to hold us up.  My parent’s health issues being one of those things.  But in the meantime, we can buy land, build a house, work on solar projects and learn everything we can about being as self sustaining as we can.

This is our journey.  Hopefully you will come along for the ride.