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["Lynn Wigglesworth" <lynnw1366 AT hotmail.com>]

>To live simply, and well IS attainable - if you have readily marketable
skills,and talents and don't mind working. Or if you >are financially
secure, and can AFFORD to live simply:)

Haha. I was thinking about you, Frank, and your land in Ky. The problem
is, homesteaders generally don't live in $250,000 homes. It takes an AWFUL
LOT of one's life energy to afford a  home like that...lots of years of
working for The Man (which is what homesteaders are trying to avoid). My
whole farm; 42 acres with home, barn, workshops, etc. cost $82,500 ten
years ago. Of course, you get what you pay for, and this isn't a cozy
ecohome. It's a draft farm house on a very run-down farm.

To me, the perfect ecovillage  would offer a range of affordable
housing...family homes, shared homes, tiny cottages... and would have work
for the 'villagers'...otherwise it's just a housing development. A farm
coop where people can, if they choose, earn enough working on the farm to
afford to live there (or work off the farm, if they choose). People would
have some freedom to find a job that suits them...raise animals, raise
produce, work in a certified kitchen to make value-added food products, do
crafts, and there would be a 'sales organization' (also proving jobs to
villagers) to market farm products on-farm or at Farmers markets, etc.
Sort of a modern day share-cropping.

Lynn Wigglesworth
Peasant Farmer
Tioga County, PA