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  • From: EarthNSky <erthnsky AT bellsouth.net>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Go ld -- feel free to ignore
  • Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 13:36:25 -0500



Clansgian AT wmconnect.com wrote:

The hobby homesteader is like my step-FIL who would proudly hold up a
tomato and say, "I don't mind telling you how much I've got in that
tomato, it cost me $23.75" The hobby homesteader depends on outside
income to pay for homestead expenses. Oh, he may say, "I eat my own
vegetables, put up my own meat, cut my own wood." But if a great
flow of dollars did not support the trellisis, bedding plants,
fertilizer, tractor, gasoline, animal feed, etc. etc. they'd have
none of those things. The homestead simply becomes a sort of money laudering proposal where instead of buying the chicken at the super
market for $3 they spend $11 each on chicks, feeders, waterers,
purchased feed, medicine, etc. and then say "See, grew it myself...
I'm ready for any emergency!"

I suppose, then, that I am a hobby homesteader. You may be right, but
generally hobbies are what people do as escape or leisure. I don't have
any other escape and I am most certainly not doing this at my leisure.



Now, see if you think this sounds like a hobby homestead: If you cut
the electric and phone lines (the only utilities we have) and locked
the front gates of this homestead, we could eat and have fuel for
cooking and heating for at least five years if not indefinately. The
clothes and tools and such we have now would do us fine in that time
or longer.

Oh, we use electicity, but we don't depend on it. It has actually
gone out for hours and nobody noticed. All work is manual or animal,
there are no machines here. We save seeds, propogate our animals,
and the whole place is a symbiosis of fertility,

Instead of going out and getting a job or plying a trade for our food
and fuel and housing, we chose to do it ourselves, directly, with no
inputs.

Draw a line there.

We try to do that, too. When the tornado messed up our field lines, we
had to replace them. We rented a backhoe and did the job
ourselves....we could not have hand dug the lines in a reasonable period
of time(months to a year) and without injury. The backhoe rental set us
back a bit, too, but I can't imagine how much debt we would have accrued
if we had hired the job out. So, does your house have a septic system
and if so, in your homestead world, how would you have handled such? How
would you have cleaned out a septic tank and laid new septic lines?
Surely not by hand, or would you have? Do you have a composting toilet?
Outhouse? (I have a little bucket toilet that I sometimes use outside,
but I when I say outhouse I mean an outdoor privy that is used 100% of
the time. I know that like us, you don't own a tractor. Would you have
rented a backhoe like we did? Is that giving to Caesar what is his?
I'm not really trying to be contradictory, just trying to see where you
draw the line.
In my mind, your total self sufficiency works only in good times,,,,if
nothing goes wrong..if a tornado comes through, or an ice storm puts a
hole in your roof(new roofing needed),,,or your kid breaks his leg,,,or
Denise severes her hand...I wonder if you would rely or need the world
outside of your gates. I think you would.
I'm not convinced that in 2008, one can be totally self sufficient in a
world of those who are not so. In the old days, like 12th or 13th
century, people worked together to solve life's big problems like the
above....there was a village doctor, midwife, blacksmith, etc. Even
then, they were not totally self sufficient. Yet, they were not
hobbyists....



If we want something besides food and fuel and such, the things a
homestead provides for us directly, we ply some trade or the other
and purchase them.

I suppose this is what you would do for the scenario with the septic
tank, too. Fair enough, but..
James...what is the difference between you plying some trade and Ron
plying his at a dealership..the difference is a regular income, however
small that might be. You are not beholden to show up at work, and
perhaps your education and experience allows you to 'consult' like this
part time..but not everyone is so lucky. In my hobby homestead world,
we need that regular income to pay the mortgage. In your homestead
world, you might take a long term job to pay for something you need or
want, too, like a medical bill.




Some people's trade is rasing cows or raising fruit. Any cows or
fruit you need beyond your own means are, by my definition, not
homestead products or homestead enterprises, but rather commercial
farming products. The only difference between what you are doing and
what I am doing is that I work wood for my cash and you sell fruit.
Both are equally commercial enterprises and both equally have nothing
whatever to do with homesteading.

Ok, so what does? I really kind of confused here, and I really want to
understand this...Leslie is gone, and I want to understand what went
awry in the conversation that upset her.


A hobby homestead is one in which the person could live as well or
better on the cash income they spend on the homestead if they just
stayed in the city.

By that definition, I am not a hobby homesteader, because my standard of
living would definitely drop on our income anywhere else.


The amount of money I spend on the homestead is generally .... zero.

I buy chicken feed because people won't keep their dogs up. I can't
afford to fence the entire property. (how do you fence your property)
What I spend is generally to provide food for either me or my animals
long term. I spent $30 for trees...the honey locusts, hazelnuts, and
apples...I spent $2 for peat moss to make my seed starter soil. I had
the other stuff needed(compost, sand, etc.) I save seeds, but I do
order seeds and plants sometimes. I need to find strawberries this
year, for example. I will spend far less buying stuff for my homestead
than I would providing for myself in the city.

I've got to do some cleaning today..change the sheets and all of that,
and I want to work some more on my 'hobby' of braiding a rug and chair
pads...I don't mean that as sarcastically as it sounded, really,,,,if I
am a hobbyist, so be it, at least I am doing something, learning
something, that will get me there eventually...

Bev



--
“Fear is the path to the Dark Side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to
hate. Hate leads to suffering.” Yoda




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