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[Clansgian AT wmconnect.com]

> >Did not the Nearings sell maple syrup and maple sugar in Vermont, then  
> blueberries in Maine?
> 


They did.  And I do.  I still sell corn meal, live chickens, an occasional 
goat (although we've eaten them all this year), and a few other things.  But 
the 
difference is this:  In a video documentary made in 1974, Helen is giving a 
tour of the blueberry plots.  She talks about selling the blueberries and 
quips, "It pays the expenses, well, it pays for the seeds and an occasional 
tool.  
You couldn' t buy a truck with it."

As you know, the Nearings kept a set of books on each farmstead showing how 
each could carry its own weight financially.  AFTER it was set up.  Their 
maple 
syrup did not pay for their truck, building their house, printing their 
books,  or the like. As I recall it didn't even pay the taxes and insurance.

My piddly little bit that I sell pays for fencing, seeds, a tool now and 
again, and sometimes for gas to haul manure from off site.  Sometimes.  Most 
of 
the time I try to combine that with a separate trip.  But that's all it pays.

What I'm comparing that to are the plans to raise sheep, or asparagus, or 
garlic and pay the mortgage, health insurance, vehicle and expenses, 
television, 
computer, wind generator, etc.  Not only do I not see any examples of that 
happening, I don't see any historical examples either ... moder lifestyle on 
a 
cottager's basis.

My paradigm only works on a 'render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's' 
basis.  Wanting a digital camera and a computer, I do a bit of computer work 
to pay for them.  It doesn't take much.  Wanting building materials, new 
boots 
(only on boots and hats do I not pinch pennies), the metal T-posts we were 
talking about, or a very (alas) very rare trip to the sushi restaurant;  I 
make 
musical instruments and sell them.  The instruments must also pay for the 
materials and tools to make them.

The thing with my plan is this:  if I don't want or need any more electronic 
gizmos, I don't do any more technical work.  When I have enough boots and 
fencing and such, I don't make any more musical instruments unless I just 
want to 
in order to amuse myself (which I often do).  Instead I go fishing or some 
such.

Never any debt.  For that we use the 'Mason jar economic system'.  I know the 
old great white hope of a truck will hang it up one day.  So from day one, 
some surplus funds, a bit here a bit there, went into the truck fund mason 
jar.  
There's one for a cow (the 401-Cow fund),  one for dental work, and also one 
for going to the movies en famile, etc.  There was one begun twelve years ago 
and fully funded three years later for a replacement freezer.  Last summer 
the 
freezer went out (partially, it gets cool now and is unplugged until we use 
it to chill off carcasses) and so without it causing any stress, we brushed 
the 
dust off the freezer fund and bought a new one.  Bye the by, all the Mason 
jars are not literal.

Homesteading, so I have found, is a marvelous basis for a personal (family, 
small group) economics.  But it is a most lousy small business.  I work to 
dispell the myth that being fully a homesteader means being nothing else.  
Homesteading for us is to enable us to do other things, to exclude them.

> . >While  
> homesteading as you do it is unlikely to become in wide practice, it  
> is a unique and useful niche and there are many who would profit by  
> trying it.

No, it won't.  And that's a fact.  But mine is only *A* good life, not *THE* 
good life.   My only two questions for the infinite variations of what's 
possible are:

1) What's the plan?  Asking that isn't pissing on anyone's parade or 
disparaging their dreams, it's slaping the plank against the ground to make 
sure it's 
sound before it's used to hold up the building. 

2) How's that working for you?

If I were to write my story on a blog or such, the theme would be those two 
questions.

And I've some reason to hope.  I notice at least a 200% increase in the plots 
of land plowed up for gardens, and it's still early here by the conventional 
wisdom,

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