Always rooting for autumn

Two whole months, whoops! I hope that you are all well and have been enjoying the sunshine. The blogging drought ends right along with the heatwave we have been basking (wilting) in - a few nights ago the clouds that had gathered tantalizingly overhead for three days broke in a rare show of thunder and lightning, our only storm of the past 12 months that I was sad had to end. We made the most of it, throwing open the windows to let in the loud rumbles and newly fresh air.

The rain has continued on and off for the past few days; the laundry has continued to pile up. The garden is loving the downpours and everything is looking newly green and perky after weeks of sparse watering. The water butt was completely empty for the first time in four years, leaving me with no excuse to not clean it out.

Perhaps it was the heat that had me in a dither, but the last few weeks I haven't felt like doing much of anything. I enjoy the heat up until a point - the point at which I really REALLY don't like it anymore. I feel the same way about high summer as I do about the depths of winter- oppressed. I find myself starting to consider a knitting project, to see if I can bring cooler days along prematurely - or at least pretend the heatwave isn't happening. I dream of pumpkin cheesecake. I want the elderberries and the rose hips to have ripened. The summer really feels like the years end to me, with late September the time of new beginnings and new projects; and I really want that freshness and newness now.

Still, the only way through the blahs is through them. We have been busy with birthdays and days out and family visits which have been lovely. Things have settled into a nice rhythm since school broke up and I am planning lots of things to fill up the days with. All of those things that are so much easier in summer - decorating, eating out of doors, trips to the beach and barbeques are all on the menu, along with lots and lots of laundry. We have weddings to attend and a summer holiday to go on. My very introverted self is going to be exhausted at the end of all of this, no matter how much I enjoy these things at the time. I look forward to the cooler days of autumn and a new knitting project on the needles as just reward.

It's going to be a long hot summer. 

The news diet

I stumbled across this summary by Rolf Dobelli of his thoughts on why 'the news' is bad for us,  ironically, whilst catching up on dreadful events unfolding an ocean away in Boston. Dreadful events that I have no personal connection to and can do absolutely nothing to alleviate, yet felt enough of a mix of compassion (good) and morbid intellectual curiosity (not good) towards that I was reading a live blog about it.

An awareness of world events is useful up to a point; and once upon a time that would have meant a morning newspaper of yesterday's news and a 10 minute evening radio bulletin. Now we have 24 hour news channels, online newspapers updated every minute and a plethora of DIY media where anyone can put their experience out there (including me). And sometimes, this is a force for good. Mostly, we don't see the wood for the trees.

Whilst I disagree with many of his assertions, I can't disagree with the thrust of Dobelli's article regarding 'the news' . We haven't had regular access to TV news for several years now - and when I do find myself watching it, I find it overwhelming. Too much graphic detail, so much negativity. Horrible things happen every single day and humans can be complete shits to each other. But I also know that good things happen, every second of everyday, and humans can be awesome. That experience is not reflected back to me in the news. In the wake of Boston, the speculation surrounding the mechanics, the motives and dynamics of the plot and plotters far outweigh the coverage of the people that came together to help. This stuff is bad for our mental heath.

The day we realised the TV aerial on our new house was not wired in changed our lives. We watch less news and instead of mindless channel surfing we watch a handful of shows and films on DVD. We get to choose where we focus our attention - even if I do occasionally get sidetracked by live blogs. I have more time to be a productive kind human. I am taking a break from my remaining news outlets - one week, cold turkey, no 'news'. I have done it before and after a few false starts (it is an almost automatic reaction to check a news website in the morning with my coffee). I suspect that I might enjoy it more this time and extend it for a little longer.

Happily, this gives me more reading time to devote to my favourite blogs - the majority of which catalogue  human adventures in trying to be productive and kind human beings. Keep them coming please :)

Life is maintenance

In these bodies we will live,
in these bodies we will die
Where you invest your love,
you invest your life

- Mumford and Sons 

Why did it take me so long to embrace this? I rallied against the day to day details of life maintenance for so long - and I never did achieve the freedom from ordinariness that I was striving for.

We live in a world of outsourcing. From the cradle to the grave, we have an endless stream of services to take care of us and our loved ones, from the TV babysitter, through nightly dinners of preprepared carrots and ready-seasoned chicken, to the heart specialists that put us back together when we have consumed too much, burnt through too much cortisol and not moved enough. If they fail? We have the undertaker to take care of our dead. The maintenance of humans has been outsourced.

The most frugal among us have so much 'stuff' - and the means to acquire more - that only the wealthiest of households would have had 60 years ago. For all our household conveniences - we have just upped the level of day to day maintenance actually required to run our lives. We don't produce it ourselves much these days - we have a whole country of cheap labour east of here to do that for us. And when we take delivery of it, we do our best to avoid maintaining it - by throwing more money and stuff and time at it.

The things we have, inspite of all our mod cons, seem to require much more maintenance. My great grandmother didn't have wall to wall carpeting, and a worktop food processor complete with 48 hard to clean attachments. She had wood or stone floors and a broom, mop and a rug beater. A knife and a whisk are sufficient food processors if you have to work 40 hours to buy a kitchen aid that you rarely use because you hate to clean it. Her laundry day was hard graft - but I suspect she actually washed a lot less stuff and she wore an apron daily to reduce the number of clothes she got through. We have a hoover, a steam cleaner and biannual use of a carpet washer. All of them are ugly and take up a lot of space. And all of them need to be wiped over and cleaned themselves occasionally. Meanwhile, I still make use of a mop and broom and rug beater for other areas of the house.

It seems the whole of modern life is an attempt to escape the maintenance to get to the fun. But the 'fun' comes at a huge price, if it comes at all. Only the super rich who can outsource everything with no care for money or paid employment have a hope of escaping this. For the rest of us - the adverts lie. And none of us can escape the environmental costs wrought by our increasingly disposable, frantic lives. More stuff, more disposable, cheaply built stuff, is wreaking havoc with our planet and our quality of life. 

Over the last few years I have taken back that which is mine to maintain. I love maintaining my humans and I love the beauty of a garden in full bloom - healthy allotment produce for the win. Laundry is much easier when you love the clothes that you are laundering. Keeping your home tidy is much more enjoyable when you think the furniture is beautiful and the textiles are worth looking after - especially so if you have poured your creativity and time into making them or refurbishing them. None of this has to cost a lot of money. I like doing a little handwashing now and again so a few delicate hand knits only add to my enjoyment of life. I love sweeping and I hate hoovering - guess who won't be having wall to wall carpet in our forever house.

I think this sums up simple living in a nutshell. The motivating values for everyone may be different, but the result is the same - the taking back of the day to day maintenance of our lives and fully embracing it, appreciating it and aligning it with our values as much as is possible - and realising that there is more room for fun and excitement when you spend less time running away from life. Life is maintenace, so you might as well make a life worth maintaining.

This poem changed my life

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.

- Wendell Berry, Manifesto:The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

The whole poem can be read here. I urge you to drop this blog now and go read it.

Sometimes it is hard to put what you want in to words. My vision for my future certainly does not condense into a neat job description complete with handy flowchart of how to get there. The glimpse has flashed in and out of my life for as long as I can remember - infuriatingly flickering at the edge of my vision in careers interviews at school. 'Oh, you change your mind so much! You will want to be something different next week!'. Indeed.

I came across this poem last year and have read it many many times since then. To all intents and purposes it is my ideal job description - that ragbag of ideas and images that have clashed vividly with just about every advised direction I have ever taken. I wonder if I had discovered Wendell Berry when I was 18, would my life have turned out very different?  This poem articulates how I have always wanted to be in the world, but have never had the courage to fully embrace, in the face of others' well meaning opinion . I want to be a mad farmer.

Going through all my old posts gave me plenty of food for thought. All the posts now tagged 'The map chest' are about where we are going what we are doing - our road map as such. What a confused little pup I was back then. I had the vaguest inkling of what it was I wanted, but it was but a glimpse, washing in and out of sight with the tides of life. Simple living, growing things, making things and an innate need to take care of people and planet - all glimpses, but never fully braided together. 

It is all much clearer now. Time to get braiding.

Ten things

In the process of moving over my old blog posts to this one, I had to read through each one and recategorise them. I spent two hours reading through what amounts to a diary of three of the most turbulent, change filled, exciting years of my life. It was back in 2010 that we really began to knuckle down and think about what we wanted in life, having started the process a few years earlier before the Credit Crunch hit.

When I started blogging back in 2010:

1. We were in debt. We are now in credit to almost double that debt amount and we put a set amount aside without fail each month. We have a budget that covers everything and we mostly stick to it.

2. We regularly used to run out of basics and be caught unawares by short term changes. We now keep a store of three months worth of basics and try to have something to harvest from the garden allotment during the warmer months. This year we hope to make that a year round deal.

 
3. We had made a couple of batches of beer from kits and a few not great wines. We are now almost self sufficient in beer brewed from grain and fruit wines. Next up - cider!

4. We regularly used to run out of basics and end up buying expensive basics from The Coop. We now keep a store cupboard with a few months worth of essentials and keep our total food budget around £200 each month.

5. We had a small yard that frustrated our limited gardening abilities. We now have that yard, an allotment, our street frontage and a whole community in which to further expand our horticultural skills.

6. I had never made compost. We now have three compost bins and I love dirt as much as life itself.

7. I couldn't spin. I can now spin. I can also follow almost any knitting or crochet pattern, if I am not winging it and making it up as I go along.

8. We had far too much stuff and a messy house. We now have half the amount of stuff and a tidier, more peaceful home - and it is getting better every day. We also seem to get twice as much fun stuff done these days.
 
9. I was an introverted homebody with few links in my local community. I am now an introverted homebody who is also involved with two different community organizations.

10. My predominant motivation was fear - fear for what the future may bring, of climate change, peak oil and financial Armageddon. I still believe all that is happening, but I do what I do because I LOVE to do it. The future looks pretty rosy when you are harvesting tomatoes, making chutney, knitting your winter socks, planning community gardens and making stew from your stock cupboard. Those things just happen to make us more resilient human beings too.

When I started writing a blog, I also didn't think anyone would actually read it! Thank you all for reading and commenting. I love writing this blog too! And thank you for writing your own wonderful blogs and sharing your projects, successes, failures, fears and dreams too.

*Edited due to ditziness - Yes, I realize I put the food cupboard in there twice... because over the last three years my brain has nodded off a bit too. Because the real number 4 was of course, that we were the hapless, overtired parents of a 20 month old boy. And now of course we are the tired, less hapless parents of a preschooler and a toddler - and lack of sleep does nothing for your blog post editing skills, even if you have the parenting lark mostly covered ; )*

Busy busy...

The great pumpkin/haribofest of 2012 has been and gone, birthdays, anniversaries, bonfires, barbeques (yes, you can get away with that sort of thing down here in October), fireworks, playdates, commitee meetings and more overtime than I ever care to do again.

Most of these things are good things. I literally look forward to halloween all year. Electronic zombie door chimes on sale in August? Well there's a form of gratuitous consumption everyone should get on board with! I like bonfires and fireworks too. But good god did it all get a bit much these past few months. I feel like I have lurched from event to housekeeping crisis to event to work crisis, day in and day out since September. The clocks going back just after a run of night shifts brought things to a head and I still haven't quite recovered my rhythm. The ridiculous thing about all this? It was partly by design.

Money is time for most people, me included. For every hour of overtime I do, the wispy threads of my daily routine snag and break. The rest of life falls apart. I have written entire posts over at The Simple Green Frugal Co-op encouraging others to manage their time wisely and to see that paid work can actually cost money not only  in terms of transport and other overheads, but how much you spend trying to catch up on all the cooking, cleaning and domestic productivity. 10 days straight and I am spinning, and not in a nice producing yarn sort of way. £40 in taxi fares where I failed to wake up at 5am and get my rear into gear on time for the bus. £15 in nice comforting food for my shifts, beacuse I sure as hell couldn't turn my bodyclock around enough to prepare anything from scratch.

Still, I can do better; and in the light of all of these fails, I am grateful. I have  job to go to, many others don't. I have a job where I can take on a few extra hours as needed, again many people would dearly love that opportunity. I have family and friends still with me whose birthdays and anniversaries are to be celebrated whilst we are all still together on this earth and for that I am truly grateful. This past halloween, I lit candles for the few who have left us during this past year; and those who vanished long before whose influence reverberates down the years as is they have merely stepped out of the room for a moment - and once again my habit of losing touch and not quite getting round to sending that email has left me smarting. A lesson for this year.

For those of you across the pond who are celebrating  Thanksgiving, I wish you a lovely day and hope you have much to be grateful for. I hope the same for all of you home here too.

Not a creature was stirring

I have been up for almost an hour - very early for me, especially at this time when I try to stay in bed for as long as humanly possible to catch up on all the shut eye I am missing. The weather has turned decidedly autumnal and the breeze coming in to the open bedroom window caused a sneezing fit cured only by a nice warming cup of tea. The house is quiet - and I am awake to witness it. Bliss.

I wish I could summon up the energy to do something productive. I could be using this time to sort the laundry, to spin, to wash up last nights dishes, to weed the garden, to bake bread - but I would prefer to be here writing this, for the simple fact that I love stringing letters one after another; and I don't have as much time to devote to it as I would like. This blog is not just an opportunity to reflect on my daily life (important), to connect with like minded folk (also important), but it gives me a chance to exercise my grey matter a little in a life dominated by toddler talk, house work and nappies (all good things). If there is one thing I have missed from my university days, apart from the freedom to stay up until 5am and rise sometime the next afternoon, is the opportunity to write and to think deeply about things. These days, the opportunity to do both at the same time rarely occurs.

If you are in the UK and have been affected by the riots of the last four nights, I wish you the very best. As an outsider looking in from a city that as it turned out didn't erupt into violence and flames and mayhem, I can't comprehend the impact it will have on the individuals and communities who were affected. The dust appears to now be settling - I hope that the aftermath brings out the very best in us all.

May you live in interesting times

The title of this post cropped up in conversation this week. It was used in jest and so unfortunately I didn't get to utter any counter curses, but it did get me thinking. 

In 2006/7 I began to read about peak oil and the economic unravelling that would ensue. I had assumed that it was a decade away and that there was plenty of time to prepare on a personal level. In January 2008, we found ourselves expecting our first child. By that summer, the world experienced its first oil shock in over 20 years. Food riots broke out across the world. By the autumn of the same year, economic instability turned to full blown collapse, bailouts and sovereign debts; and grandad was reading his newborn grandson bedtime stories from the financial pages of bank collapses and share price falls. Then for a year or so, at least in the UK, everything went rather quiet. House prices rose once again, unemployment rose conservatively considering the scale of the financial bubble that had burst, inflation wasn't taking hold and the oil price had collapsed. I had thought at the time that this was 'the big one' and was amazed that everything turned back to to normal so quickly.

On reflection, having discussed the state of the universe at some length with armchair philosopher types over pints of home brew, we realised that something was going to give. The only question was what and when?

Today I find myself 22 weeks pregnant with a daughter conceived just as the sleeping dragon began to limber up once again last autumn. Once again I am pregnant at a time of immense turbulence. By July, when our daughter arrives, I imagine that things will be coming to a head if they haven't already. In the last few months, food prices have once again risen to record highs. The entire Middle East is undergoing a revolution that was inconceivable to most a year or so ago. Oil prices appear to be heading for a spike once again. Major natural disasters have devastated communities and agricultural regions across the world at a time when the financial resources to deal with them are becoming more scarce.

The world looks an infinitely more interesting place in 2011; and for the last few months I have wavered between exuberant hope and extreme anxiety for what the future holds.  My children will probably not grow up in the relatively stress free world that I have, where we just assumed that we would find ever shinier, newer, energy intensive solutions to solve all of our environmental and social problems. In all likelihood, it isn't going to happen; and on many levels that is terrifying. On the other hand, as in all crises (right up to the final terminal one) their lies opportunity. Some things will fade away, losses will be suffered - and then new things will replace them. I don't believe that a huge, terminal apocalypse is on its way; which means that there must be wiggle room to create something...interesting. Interesting in a good way, not in a fake Chinese curse way.

A few days away from the Internet focusing on everyday things has done me the world of good. Preparation is a good preventative measure against despair real or imagined. Today I knuckled down to seed sowing and allotment planning (more of which another day), laundry and tidying, all whilst drinking in the sunshine. The nesting instinct is strong this time around and with a tidier (though still not tidy) house apparently comes a tidier happier mind. Best to get all the hard work out of the way now, before I become too fat and heavy and grumpy to move further than between the sofa and the biscuit tin, I think.

Incidentally, a quick heads up. If in future years you see me sporting another baby bump (although highly unlikely) - pay attention - with my track record on timing, it's probably time to run for the hills, or at least duck and cover for a while.

Preparing for christmas.

A rare trip to the supermarket last week caused me to adopt my seasonal bah humbug attitude a few weeks earlier than normal. Meandering down the  aisle of pretty christmas lights and baubles and garlands (glittery twinkly shiny stuff in the depths of an otherwise grey winter is one aspect of the holiday season that I can get on board with), thinking that it would keep Gus amused for a few minutes; I had failed to account for the presence of a massive display of  Toy Story 3 merchandise at the end of the aisle. Mine was not the only child within earshot that was clamoring to get out of his trolley seat, though I shamefully admit that he was the only one that took off his shoes in a fit of rage and threw them at a complete stranger's feet. After apologising, I hastily made my escape in the opposite direction, to more screams of protest from the now incensed boy; and turning the corner crashed into another stack of said merchandise. A quick sweep revealed I had walked into a parenting booby-trap, displays of Buzz Lightyear and Woody for the boys alternated with shelves full of Hello Kitty and Disney Princesses for the girls.

I have known, from the tenderly cynical age of ten, that this isn't what the biggest festival of our calendar should be about. Then again, neither is my well honed cynicism and refusal to get into the joy of a seasonal celebration that marks the coldest and darkest time of year. There is a reason that a midwinter festival of some sort occurs throughout the cold and temperate regions of the world, across religions; and who am I to have argued with the recived wisdom of my ancestors? The songs, stories and traditions of this time usually highlight the return of light to the world, tales of hope and redemption, peace and goodwill, the promise that a community could make it through the long harsh nights and bitter weather.  Central heating and air freighted strawberries have successfully killed that spirit for many, but the message should not be lost, especially in the depths of recession and increasing hardship.

That is I think what needs to be regained; and perhaps here in the UK, because we no longer celebrate our harvest festivals, a time for giving thanks for all that has been gathered in the previous year. I know that I need to recapture the joy of the Christmas; and trying to stick it to those who see this merely as an annual merchandising opportunity, whilst not strictly charitable of spirit, would only heighten my joy. This year I will be working Christmas and Boxing Day (yup, nothing screams celebration and sticking it to 'em like a regular day at the office),  I am on a low-fat diet thanks to gallstones (out with the mincepies, stuffed goose, chocolate santa breakfast and cheese and cracker selection then) and thanks to the debt repayment plan I have little money to plough into a celebration.  These supposed annoyances might just go in my favour and actually support my sticking it to 'em quite nicely. I have little money to spend, so I am going to be very careful where I spend it.  I can't binge on regular seasonal fare which means a lot of thoughtful food choices and cooking from scratch.

This week I began my preparations by making salt dough decorations; and being thankful that I have enough food in the depths of winter that I could throw it into pretty craft projects. That seems an appropriate start to a more frugal, meaningful season.

Epiphany

I wrote a post yesterday about how I tend to sabotage myself, before I even get started. Ironically, I didn't publish it, because who would want to read that anyway?

No amount of navel gazing will actually move you forward. You can believe that you will never be as good at something as you want to be. You can believe that perfection is an achievable goal.  You can believe that there is always someone else that will do something better than you ever will. You can believe that there are outside agencies that will prevent you from achieving what you want. You can believe that any mistake you have ever made condemns you to failure for the rest of your days. You can believe any of the negative mind chatter that you want to believe about yourself, that stops you moving forward to where you want to go.

When I say you, obviously I mean me. I realise now after all these years there is an easier way to live. Just ignore the mind chatter; much in the way you would ignore someone trying to sell you extra cable TV, or double glazing for a house you don't own, or a handcart trip to hell and other crap you don't need. Those people eventually give up and go home. If you are too busy concentrating on the things you really want to succeed at, whether that be designing knitting patterns, growing prize pumpkins, becoming financially independent, or becoming world Tetris champion, self sabotaging thoughts won't have room to take root. Life is too short to let the ghosts of everyone who has ever criticised you, called you names, told you you are incapable or made you feel that you can never ever be good enough, to rule your life. You can't gaze at your navel and the horizon at the same time; and I know which one is generally more worthy of study.


It's all just a case of deciding to begin; and then deciding to keep on carrying on. So I have decided to begin.

Minimalism vs. the farm (vs. my brain)

The last few weeks I have been on a decluttering drive and it has made a huge difference to our home. I have vastly scaled back in the kitchen, the book collection, my yarn stash (all that acrylic has gone to a better place where it will be made into something beautiful) and now I am moving on to our wardrobes, again.

As I am clearing however, I feel a certain unease. Many of the things that I own serve a useful purpose - the kitchen equipment, the craft materials, gardening bits and bobs. When I peruse other blogs, where people are settled into their smallholdings and self reliant lifestyles, they do seem to be surrounded by an awful lot of stuff. Tools, books, craft materials, bake ware, canning equipment, extra linens and clothing...all seem necessary if you are going to have a degree of self reliance and sufficiency. Which is making me wonder - do I really want that lifestyle? I love the idea of producing our own food, tending animals, hand crafting many of the things we need in our day to day lives. But does that mean I will have to maintain lots of stuff? Is it that the more skills I learn, the more equipment I will need; and the bigger the space I will need to accommodate it all?

I love my new found lack of stuff - I have enough that I can live a simple lifestyle in a small terraced house in the city. But the part of me that has an eye on possible power cuts and economic disruption in the not too distant future is less sanguine about throwing out that second hand-cranked torch and extra layers of clothing, 'just in case'. Then there is the incredibly optimistic part of me, scouting the horizon for our 'farm' with a veg patch and pantry and workshop, that wants to keep the maslin pan and perhaps invest in some more cookware and knitting needles, for when the time comes.

Decluttering is temporarily halted. My brain is about to explode.

Time to reflect on how far we have come

A few of my activities today have put me in reflective mood. Our little baby boy is no longer a baby, but a talkative and independent twenty-two month old! Time has flown and much has changed since he was born, in the last year especially.

Some of the important things that we have done in the past twelve months:

Finances - We have paid off £2000 debt. This is perhaps the most exciting thing to reflect on. I know that we could have done even better than this, but we afforded ourselves a few luxuries along the way. Even so, two credit cards are now gone, and we no longer have overdraft facilities. Every month we have a little money put aside spare, which is a position I never imagined we would be in for the next decade! We have also transferred the majority of the remainder of the debt to 0% interest rates, which means that we will be able to pay it off faster every month.

Home - We have been on a massive decluttering mission this year. We have charity bagged, chucked out and car booted possessions that I had deep emotional (read 'hoarding instinct') attachments to just a few years ago. the house is clearer (though by no means complete) and our lives are lighter. Hopefully other people benefited from our stuff too. We also invested in some solid furniture as ours wore out; I think we finally grasped the importance of quality and beauty and functionality over quantity.

Practical skills - Over the last few years we have been knuckling down and learning the skills for true self reliance. So new found money management skills aside:

• This year I have put much more effort into the garden and developing my food growing skills; and from just a few containers our harvest over the next few months is looking promising. I am branching out into winter crops this year too. Unfortunately I haven't learnt the art of war against caterpillars. There's always next year...

•  Our home brewing (OH's) and wine making (mine) enterprise is going well and is very satisfying work . OH is about to start his first non-kit, from mash brew. I have plans for lots of foraged fruit wines and perhaps some cider in the months ahead. As well as the finished product (which has an uncanny ability to win you friends and influence people!), I find the whole process fascinating. 

•  I have developed my knitting and crochet beyond basic stitches and simple shaping. Now I wonder every time I need a soft furnishing or item of clothing, 'can I knit that?'. Being able to make basic items like socks, hats and gloves to keep us warm comforts me deeply.

• I can finally bake a loaf of good bread, along with lots of other baked/skillet staples.

Parenting - we have had to learn patience, tolerance and a  good dose of selflessness. But thankfully our little boy teaches us as painlessly as possible, with the most fun and smiles he can muster (which is a LOT). Oh, and when handed a pooey baby, I can close off my smell receptors and have that baby cleaned and pinned in a terry cloth before others have stopped retching - which is good progress for an only child that was never entirely sold on being a parent.

I realise now that we are closer to living our dreams than I usually give credit for. It is so easy to focus on what we don't have, what we want to be doing and what we don't feel we are doing well enough. I know now that goals and dreams are built one and every moment at a time, until you arrive at the place where you want to be. If the goals are the right ones for you, then the journey will be as enjoyable as the destination.

Low impact living for a high impact life

I think my philosophical meanderings over recent weeks have taken their toll on me a little and I am seeing the future through gloom tinted spectacles. Every goal I decide upon seems wanting somehow and I am once again paralysed by indecision.

So I have decided to start steering a course and hope I land up somewhere...nice. There are a couple of things that I know I want that I now recognize have drifted in and out of my consciousness since I was a child:

• To own my own 'homestead', size to be determined at a later date when I have explored a few other activities I might want to incorporate into my daily existence. May range from terrace house with good garden to large permaculture farm away from 'civilization'. I would like to produce a good fraction of our food and perhaps even fibres (a girl's gotta knit; and possibly even weave by then!) and also be self reliant (not necessarily sufficient) in energy. There would be an outdoor 'room' space too, a porch or fire pit. No idea where in the world it would be, apart from near to the coast, somewhere you can look up and see stars, not sulphur lamp. Abroad appeals. 

• To travel and have adventures, in a low impact way. I like the idea of packing a trailer and going bicycle touring. Perhaps a bit of trekking. There will definitely be tents and camp stoves and marshmallows. I think that this is something that Gus would enjoy too, even if I struggle to convince daddy of the merits of leaving his brum-brum at home.

• To earn a living by being productive, by which I mean producing genuinely valuable goods - whether that be food, music, knitted clothing or good cheer - in the lowest impact way possible. 

• To be involved in some kind of ecological restoration - whether that be forest planting, beach clean ups or a bit of guerilla gardening.

•  To spend more of my hours in good company. I have a tendency to be a bit of a recluse, yet really enjoy the company of good friends when I manage to get it together and get in contact. 

• To be proficient in a (portable, probably stringed) musical instrument. Because the above campfires/porch/friends/marshmallows are not going to provide their own soundtrack.

• I would like to be fluent in another language, because I think that being able to read and speak and comprehend another cultures language will open windows on the world to savour. Again, I don't know which one...perhaps more than one.

That's my list. I know that it isn't very precise, is apt to change and as yet has no measurable targets and mini goals attached to it. But just reading it makes me feel more positive about the future. I have something to aim for, but the striving for it, unlike so many of the other life goals I have contempleated, does not require me to place an unsustainable burden on the biosphere and doesn't induce massive amounts of guilt - or debt. It seems doable in a world with a significantly reduced energy supply and consumption too.

In Depletion and Abundance, the author Sharon Astyk talks about the Jewish concept of Tikkun Olam, or 'the repair of the world'. Whilst it no doubt has specific connotations within Jewish culture, I like the idea that it conjures up for me, the idea that I could; and should; contribute something meaningful to the world, to mend that which is broken. The place to start is of course with my own life, by first minimising the harm that I could be doing. Anything on top of that is just gravy that makes life a joy to live.

Working out 'simple'

I am in a bit of a funk at the moment as to what 'simple' means to me. I want to really knuckle down to setting goals (which has never been my forte - I'm more of a go with the flow type of gal). 'Simple living' means many things to many different people. One of the maxims I have come across frequently is 'focus on what is important to you' - but this may be a very different lifestyle from the Amish simple lifestyle, if say, training to be an astronaut is my passion. To some people simple living means spending less (but not necessarily consuming less), to others it means living and working in a minimalist environment and to still others, complete self sufficiency.

Yesterday I was reacquainted with the phrase 'Live simply, so that others may simply live'. I like it. I think I have found the definition of simplicity that I want to embody everyday of my life. I need to start using my fair share of the resources available, so that others may have theirs too. I need to recognise when I have 'enough', when having more adds nothing to my experience, or even detracts from it.  It is hard to do in a culture that doesn't realise there is a broken connection between its brain and its belly, resulting in a hunger that can never be sated. For all my good intentions I give in to temptation on a daily basis.

I spent a fruitless few hours yesterday surfing the web for what exactly my 'fair share' looks like. I think that I had hoped  that somebody had made a pie chart of resources and how much of each a person could consume every year. No such luck. The closest anyone has come is the ecological footprint calculator which tells you how many Planet Earths would be required if everyone lived like you. There are a few out there and they all give slightly different results. If you live in the 'West', chances are they are well above 1 (the UK average is 3 - and I am guessing that we aren't the worst). My own footprint comes out at 2.25. That's not my fair share and I have some work to do.

Peak denial

"But let’s be perfectly honest: Any steps we might take to prepare for a potential environmental, societal, or economic disruption, no matter how grand, are nearly certain to be insufficient. Nevertheless, they are still necessary. They will be insufficient because being perfectly prepared is infinitely expensive. But actions are necessary because they help us align our lives with what we know about the world. In my experience, when gaps exist between knowledge and actions, anxiety (if not fear) is the result. So it’s not the state of the world that creates the anxiety quite as much as it is someone’s lack of action." 

-Chris Martenson in Resilience: Personal Preparation (The Post Carbon Reader Series: Building Resilience)

In 2006 I first came across the concept of 'Peak Oil', first from an article in National Geographic and then through 'The Party's Over' by Richard Heinberg. It is an excellent introduction to peak oil theory and I highly recommend it as a starting point. Where initially I had enthusiasm for preparing and reskilling for a powered down future, in recent months I have been steering clear of anything related to peak oil, climate change and financial meltdown. Quite frankly, it all got too much and it left me almost paralysed with foreboding and despondency.

It becomes hard to to ignore something when it goes mainstream. At the same time as I was trying my best to pretend the issues away, this report was launched, not from the usual suspects, but from some of the largest corporations and businesses in the UK. This was followed swiftly by dire warnings from the US military and the British governments former chief science advisor David King who was scathing about our approach to energy security. Still, I have persevered with my magical thinking.

Unfortunately my blue sky approach has just hit a storm front in the form of this report from Lloyd's of London. I haven't waded through it yet and I probably never will, but the fact it comes from the heart of La-La land (that'll be the City), it is a wake up call just for its very existence. Its existence, combined with the horrifying images coming from the Gulf of Mexico over the last few months; and the tales of financial woe coming from regular people on some of the forums I visit; has led me to re question my attitudes.

My wake up call was followed by a period of anxiety for the future. The quote from Chris Martenson (creator of The Crash Course) sums up my mood. I realised that as a family unit, we were not doing what we needed to do with the knowledge that we have. I wasn't entirely sure that my OH and I were even singing from the same hymn sheet - he is a total petrol head and is more likely to be found on PistonHeads (I'm not even going to countenance it with a hyperlink) looking for old fuel guzzling bangers than The Oil Drum looking for crude production statistics.

Yesterday we sat down and had a short chat. I started by asking him what kind of world we would be living in as Gus grew up. We agreed that we had probably reached, or were close to peak oil production. We agreed that the climate was changing and that food and political security were uncertain. We agree that the West's time as the global superpower was over and that whatever is left over will be going east. We envisioned that within the next 10 years, there will probably be oil shocks, blackouts and economic hardship for many people.  We agreed that people that "could never live without their hair straighteners/mobile/weekly nail appointment" would probably learn to. We agreed that technology would adapt, but the level of energy use and convenience provided by the oil binge we have been on would never be matched. Our vision of the future looks somewhere between the home front of WWII and the appropriate technology experiments of the 1970s, hopefully with the internet and progressive attitudes thrown in. We both agreed that the future was not destined to be apocalyptic.

I feel better, because I know that we both broadly agree where the world is going. Which means that we will be able to broach the subject (in all fairness, it will probably be me doing all the broaching...at least until PistonHeads shuts down) with each other and make plans and changes as as and before the need arises.

I will document what we are up to in this blog, which is probably going to take a slightly different direction to the one that I was expecting. Simplifying doesn't necessarily mean powered down, but with a bit of extra thought it can be just that.

Holiday

This week has been a holiday week. I actually worked my regular hours whilst my OH took the week off and entertained family who came down for Goodwood. Whilst wistfully staring out of my office window, thinking about the rest of my family (and it seems, the rest of the nation) who were out picnicing and paddling and generally chilling, I had time to mull a few things over.

First, I realised that I am rubbish at booking holiday. I have used about 3 days of my allowance this year so far and have nothing booked. I always end up saving it because I know it causes my boss hassle to cover it and it generally causes grief to whichever colleagues get left short staffed that partcular day. It sucks, however, because I know deep down I prioritise not wanting to cause a little bit of work for others way above taking time out for myself and my family.

I also thought long and hard about how much I enjoy the days off I have; and I realise that the answer is actually 'very little'.  I end up focusing on the things I hate doing and seem to have very little time for the things that I would love to do. My life is filled with too much routine and drabness, which is about as far as you can get from the life I always envisioned for myself and my family when I was growing up. Whilst I am beginning to appreciate the importance of some routines (life is more enjoyable, for example, when you keep on top of the housework and laundry pile), I realise that days can go by without me learning anything new.

I have now requested some holiday for later in the year and resolve to be less kind to my (admittedly lovely) boss and request holiday to suit myself and not feel guilty about it. I still managed a few trips out this week, which were fun, because I was forced to actually do things that were life and knowledge expanding; and spent time in good company. My 22 month old son sees the world with such wonder (his current most used word is 'Wowwwwww') and is always looking for new things to explore; I don't see why adults should be any different. If we were focused on the things that matter and were seeing the world clearly, we should probably be saying 'Wow' several times a day. Anything else is a waste of a life.

Making my own life work

A few years ago, I was in a truly bad place. I had many drains on my energy; many of them in the form of 'friends', many of them from my own imagination (the drains, not the friends, that is!). I had failed to live up to the standards I had set for myself, or at least, the standards I thought were my own. Over the last few years, several events have transformed my view of the world and my place within it. The financial instability of the last few years combined with my increasing awareness of issues such as peak oil would have normally paralysed me with hopelessness and fear. Fortunately for me, my son arrived at the height of the chaos. There is nothing like being responsible for a baby human to make me buck up my ideas, apparently!

 A person whose writings have helped me greatly is this  wonderful lady. Her blog is a treasure trove not just of practical information, but also of inspiration and food for thought. She argues the case for voluntary simplicity and authenticity beautifully. She is not the only one of course, but her blog is an excellent starting point for those who feel something is missing in their overly hectic lives.

I want this blog to record my own thoughts, ideas and research on how to live a good life. Writing this post has allowed me to think about where I am coming from and where I will be going next. I still often feel that my life doesn't work as well as everyone else's. I have a natural tendency to dreaminess, an aversion to scheduling; and a far too strong inclination towards despondency. I still do not have great routine, laundry piles up and I find it hard to clear the kitchen sides after I have worked on them. I realise that my life would work a lot more smoothly if I could cut the clutter, prioritise and plan ahead; and in general be more hopeful and joyful. So my life is still; and ever will be; a work in progress - but I hope that I become more beautiful and refined as time goes by!