Free-Range Living

 

 (Occasional blog)

 'No Itch to be Rich --- re-visited --  '

'Loads of money --- '

To have 'loads of money', and lead the 'lotus eating' life of 'leisure and pleasure' is one way of going about leading life , which the mainsteam cultures of western-style consumer cultures seem to push -to further their own interests? - quite a bit as the route to contentment, happiness, and --- fulfillment (--?? -possibly a step too far?). Whilst this approach is to some extent understandable and no doubt an attractive proposition to those living 'difficult' lives, the 'love of money' approach surely can be a touch 'one dimensional', considering how many differing lifestyle types there can be - ? What about the 'creative' approach, thinking of the skilled 'creators', those craftsmen who've appeared in these pieces before, the woodworker artfully creating his handcrafted stylish wooden furniture pieces, and studiously ignoring the pile of money an ol' boy aquaintance left him:

 'Why would I give up what I love to do?' was his comment on whether he might now expand his small business and employ others 'to do the work'. 

 Or the farmer with his top quality herd of 'old fashioned' dairy cows under pressure 'from all sides' to 'send them down the road' and get the new 'milkpouring machines' variety in, to then 'make more money' :

 'But building up this herd is my life's work, from which I get great satisfaction and enjoyment, I'm ok for money, why would I need more of it?' 

This farmer used to go to fetch his cows in from their grazing field early, just to have the time to 'stand and stare', taking time to enjoy his creation --- 

'Creative types --- '

 What about plenty of others - entertainers, care/health workers, inventers, engineers, sports people, professional folk, farmers, explorers, vocational types such as educators, pioneer types, and all the rest, who'd  potentially miss out on 'life fulfillment' if they just went down a narrow 'money accumulation' road - ? It's surely too narrow a path to cater for the multifarious human biodiversity that exists in life - ?

Here in the UK on the eco organic micro-holding (small smallholding) in the UK midlands, it's perhaps easier than for many to lead a consciously 'money restricted' life, aiming to stem the powerful 'flow' of the mainstream culture, with the general purpose being to try to avoid the seemingly common 'more, more' trend. To exist rather within a set budget and find 'creative' ways to satisfy needs, some of them using the money medium (living in a money-geared culture), some via courtesy of the semi self-sufficient system here, satisfied in non-monetary ways (eg. home produced food supplies) .

Other 'counter-money' strands of the 'micro-holding' lifestyle here involve 'low money outlay' manoevres, such as sourcing free energy supplies eg. wood, to dilute log buying costs, making useful edifices such as the retreat cabin and the cottage back porch out of essentially re-cycled no-cost waste products, employing a self-contained low-cost food growing system (self-supporting for instance in on-going soil fertility levels), and re-cycling where possible to access reasonably cost motors, clothes, implements, and the like. 'Living the lean resource use efficient lifestyle ---- '

'Anti money --- ?'

Taking active and conscious measures to counter and 'push-back' at the great tidal wave of 'money saturation' maybe even necessary to survive the potential mind-bending power of money itself. In this small backwater rural area of the UK for instance there is a useful facility - a relatively new village hall with the function of facilitating community activity, gatherings and well-being. One problem, though, has been maintaing this view of the prime function of the place, as 'making money' seems to have become virtually an ubiquitous 'automatic' no. 1 aim. It's not the main aim of this facility though -it's rather the 'means' to help achieve the 'end' -that of promoting community togetherness - still important as without sufficient on-going finance the place doesn't function, but nevertheless, playing in this instance a supporting role.

'Lean living -- '

 Finding low-cost answers to living needs can give certainly a sense of intrinsic satisfaction, plus a good feeling of 'striking back' against what at times can appear as a 'rapacious' mainstream culture, particularly now there are so many large business entities,often using their overweaning power in the market place to practise 'on the make' business moves ---- (the 'free market' business 'philosophy' having now morphed into a 'free-for-all' market full of large predators due to the important 'perfect market' condition of having 'many buyers and sellers' in the market place, not being in place).

'Money restricted living ----- in practice'

Now in late September the summer growing season here at the micro-holding is drawing to a close with this year the usual mixed cropping results. The broad bean crop was one of the best ever, along with a decent onion crop, peas were a disaster and potatoes a poor crop -'yer canna win 'em all' -but since then runner beans, beetroot, landcress, lettuce, spring onions and the rest have all been reasonably plentiful, along with the tomato crop. Weather-wise it's been quite a hot year here with plentiful sunshine  - good for solar production and record environmental scheme payments - but there's been little rain, the irrigator having had to have been on quite regularly, otherwise no veg. production - fortunately no water meter on site.

More of the stored wood supply has been sawn up over summer, with the result that now just before the woodstove gets lit for the winter season, the woodstore is looking satisfyingly full, regular sawing sessions throughout the summer having incrementally added to the pile, same too for the 'small wood' bunker, small wood being used alongside the logs to keep a good fire burning.

Now in mid September, site maintenance is the order of the day with plentiful hedgecutting and lopping activities on the cards, as well as 'small stuff' activities, such as planting out the autumn onion sets ('baby onions') - surprising as ever how much needs doing before the onset of winter, but then there is the mid-winter rest period of a couple of months or so of 'semi-hibernation' to look forward to.

'Money best as a facilitator --- ?'

Money came about because trade exchanges could be awkward and 'lumpy'. In bygone more 'self-sufficient times', for instance, one interesting programme on TV back along demonstrated rural life in the UK in the 1600's with farming folk of the time having to make their own soap -no supermarkets or even corner shops about in those days (and interestingly where this micro-holder found out about the 'soil sweetening' effect of the mild alkali that is wood ash, used on the programme for home soap making).

Imagine say, a farmer needing the local thatcher to put a new thatch roof on the homestead   - how to 'pay' for it if money non-existant - ? Bartering (direct exchange of goods and/or services) would happen then but if the farmer said 'I'll give ye six pigs in exchange for the new roof', the thatcher could well respond 'but I ain't got a place to put six pigs' - or similar --- So when money came along it was pretty darn handy to be able to facilitate exchange of goods and services far more easily ------

Being aware of what's wished for --- '

At some stage money then became a desirable entity in its own right, but even then it did not immeditaly cause difficulties. If, say a local merchant was perceived in those days to be a little too keen on 'self-gain', or swinging things a little too much in their own favour, they would often then be ostracised by the local group of fellow merchants, hitting both their business and social statuses somewhat negatively -('no man is an island'). Money though being what it is, some say, acted like a drug, and the attractions of personal wealth must have grown considerably -not too hard to see why -, and helped - probably considerably again? - by the modern cultural focus strongly on 'personal gain', with a then detrimental effect, again some would say, on social matters and life and community values. ('no man is an island' - ?)

Apt quotes --- '

Some notables have had their qualms about the rise of any 'money mania' - Charles Kingsley, a well-known author of the 20th century, writing the classic 'The Water Babies', wrote witheringly : 

'To have all that money, they must have been dull enough to want it in the first place'

The well-known UK comedy actor John Cleese's comment was : 

'Money has spoilt everything' ,

whilst the singer Bob Dylan said :

'If a person get's to do what they want all day, money is of secondary importance'

'Money brings happiness -  or not - ?'

It's been reported in the broadsheet newspapers that the wealthy aren't particularly happy, worrying and fretting about their position in the 'wealth league table' and are actively seeking therapy. Whilst such a situation may come over as fairly ludicrous to some, if money has drug-like addiction qualities and 'money thrall' exists, then presumably, like any addiction, treatment might be necessary - ? Some though might say that it could be more effctive in the longer-term to accept/live with any 'discomfort' wealth might bring to an individual, to then investigate/explore the 'condition' -?

The modern era of very considerable personal gain and wealth may indicate an over-focus situation then causing imbalance in important strands of life  - the two that seem to come straight to mind being the 'social' strand - people live in societies - and the spiritual (personal) strand, which has seemingly withered on the cultural vine, whilst at the same time it's also reported that a majority of people rate themselves as to some degree 'spiritual' - (?)

'Down to earth ----- '

As the yearly growing cycle slows down to a virtual halt, thoughts turn to next year's season, with its needed seeds shortly to be ordered from the reliable non-exploiting value-for-money firm in the east of England. Then after that semi-hibernation rest spell it'll be then time to get a layer of woodash onto half the growing area, and then a couple of layers of home-made two year old compost -free fertiliser, which seems to do the trick, in terms of decent size healthy and tasty veg, along with rotational growing and occasional green manuring (growing a quick green crop - say of wheat -to then dig it under).

What will be the conditions for growing next year, different to this year that's for sure? The woodash, a mild alkali, keeps the ground 'sweet', otherwise continous growing on a patch of land can turn it 'sour' -the soil then becoming too acidic, It's all good 'grist to the mill', and in due course, remembering the good ol' boy Somerset farmer's urgings -'tek yer time me boyo, tek yer time', it will no doubt all come to pass ----

 ?