Thirty-five years ago
[rambling]
Thirty-five years ago I was five. Must have been 1971. I lived in a log cabin my parents had built a hundred yards or so from my uncle’s commune in the mountains above Boulder. For some reason, it was important to my mother that her kids not be raised in a communal geodesic dome where a bunch of folks hung out, smoked dope, and tried to figure out how to make their own LSD.
No running water. No electricity. No refrigeration. Outhouse. Had to hike in at least half a mile through the snow in winter. (Despite popular belief, it was uphill only one way.)
It seems about 1000 years and a million miles from my life today.
Looking at my kids, I can’t say they’re any happier than I was. And looking at myself, I don’t think I can claim to be any happier than my parents were then. Life’s different. Far more complicated. It’s full of lots more material crap. But strangely, it’s not “better.”
[/rambling]
this may sound bizarre, but not even considering the happiness factor, i sometimes wonder if i’m raising my children to be dull adults because they have it so easy.
hmmm...maybe there’s a business idea in there somewhere…
Posted by brandon on 09/08 at 05:32 PMlast time i lived in the mountains with no plumbing, electricity, three quarters (so there) of a mile uphill from the road was about 13-14 years ago. the last stint was three years, which was the longest amount of consecutive time i stayed there.
other than a few overnights, i live with all mod cons now.
much of it i do miss. so much. the sky at night. the smell of woodsmoke. the feel of the fire. the trees. the space. the air. yeah. the sunrise through the trees. just sitting out there being in it mostly. the presence. the stillness and the activity of the wild woods.
plumbing is nice though. and work is closer. not sure that’s really an advantage at times.
but you know there’s just nothing like hauling your semi-wet laundry up the hill in two feet of slow in blowing wind on a sled in the dark.
oh the sacrifices. you spins the wheel and you takes your choice.
Posted by limine on 09/09 at 07:38 PMmy kids insist i’m a cavewoman because i don’t have internet service/won’t let them online. personally, i think they watch far too much tv that reminds them of what everyone Must Have/Want (they’re lucky i still let them watch tv...). and often the tv alone sends me into ‘when i was a kid’ rants (there were 3 channels, depending on the weather). and tho i think they’re susceptible to those commercials/brain washing, i realize that i too, am almost certain that i’m not as good as the rest of the world because i don’t have high speed/dsl/hd/vios/tivo etc etc.
it’s a vicious circle.
Posted by goliard on 09/11 at 09:23 AM(Finally, finally coalescing my thoughts into workable form here. :)
I can’t even touch the notion of what constitutes a “better” life, although I will allow that the material crap that is supposed to make certain things easier can actually make them harder. You do say that life is more complicated now, but I’m wondering if that’s because you’re an adult now, and adult life is complicated. I’m sure that when you were a kid, you didn’t find it all that uncomplicated to walk half a mile in snow and to use the outhouse and to grow vegetables and to spin wool and to live without electricity. (My parents had a huge garden when I was a kid, and my memories of that time are filled with picking rocks that had been rototilled out of the soil, dipping corn kernels into this funky solution meant to keep the crows away, weeding weeding weeding, and vowing that when I grew up, I would never keep a garden this big. :) Meanwhile, your mom was thinking of all this, plus the big questions of how to keep you and your brother fed and clothed and alive, to say nothing of fostering excellent character development. I think there are states of mind that adulthood just fosters—one of them being that life is more complicated, because, well, it *is*.
Hmmm...so much for workable thought. ;)
Posted by Bakerina on 09/21 at 05:43 AM
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