(This is a longer post than I usually add, but there is a lot I felt needed to be shared.)
I read an article on Tiny House Blog this
morning about a young couple who took their family of five and headed to a Yurt
in rugged eastern Idaho. The story
continued to list all the things they were doing without, and brought in the
ethical issues and the social stresses a choice like that could bring.
And
that brought me to the mental list and reasons for my moving to tiny house
living. I don’t actually want to give up
“everything” – a moving target concept there – and drop off the grid. I’m not antisocial or flighty. But the economic and practical applications
of the change in lifestyle are the pivot point.
I see
it everywhere. Even the forums I look
thru to give me technical ideas and tips for projects I have are permeated with
assumptions and perspectives radically different than my reality.
Economically
– I am a single woman, almost a senior, who is disabled. It happened abruptly in my career, and before
I could make the transition financially or mentally – I had fallen thru a huge
crack in our social system.
Ideologically
– I believe we have become wholesale consumers with a disposable expectation
and no basic sense of responsibility to the resources we have. Therefore I want to limit my footprint, use
renewables whenever and wherever possible, approach every resource allocation
with a reuse solutions, and recycle.
Compost, rainwater, grow my own, zero trash…
But
side by side with that – I LOVE technology! I don’t believe it has corrupted us
in itself, but maybe the reasons we demand the ever- increasing range of
abilities have.
I
don’t want to get back to anything. I
want to move forward from where we are.
Take the puzzle apart and make a new picture. I find no conflict whatsoever between leaving
my tiny house each day to go work in a lab, nor do I want to eschew my
connections to the World Wide Web for a campfire and pit toilet. I love my
sewing machine, I want access to medical care, and I love my truck.
My
ethical decisions are my commitments to my family and whether to use propane. But trying living in America today without a
lease, mortgage, or land. Functionally –
without those things – you don’t. You
don’t live anywhere.
As to
tiny houses. They are great – but they
have wheels for a reason. They aren’t
connected to sewer, water, electric, gas, or trash. People continue to find ways to outfit them
with as many of those needs addressed on board, but even that is expensive and
regulations can make them a struggle to incorporate. On the other end, full-time RVing has become
a solution – but only if you can afford it.
They pay for all of those connections thru a campground or RV park – or
someone’s driveway.
Apart
from the expense of acquiring them and then parking them, somehow you have to
pay for fuel, insurance, licensing, and maintenance for the new craze. The number is growing, but you don’t find too
many single women out there on the road – and our society still frowns on a
capable older woman.
Another
fact. I simply won’t be welcome in one
of those parks with chickens in my laundry room - or anywhere else for that
matter. ;-) Nor can I build a moveable garden in my 20’ travel trailer. (However, I will grow cilantro and basil and have
a really nice spider plant.) We don’t
understand how anyone could want to live in a house on wheels as their primary
lifestyle – owning (and owing for) a piece of ground is the American dream!! Having a travel trailer or tiny house costs
to park it. How many of the stories
you’ve read are about someone who lives in theirs on the property of a family
member or friend. Walmart lets you stop
on the way, and for free. Very little
else is available. We don’t want
riff-raff and ne’er-do-wells hanging out littering the landscape. We’d prefer they live ugly in a box on the
street in some terrible part of town.
America does not want the homeless to live – well, or otherwise. It believes that no one could be homeless
unless they chose it. Sure they did –
they chose medical bills to save the life of their family member over the
mortgage. They chose to have an accident
that made them unable to work just long enough to lose everything. They chose not to pay a bill with the money
they didn’t have.
No
matter how I got here, I’m creating a life I can value and respect. I have an old travel trailer I will be
lovingly (and economically) restoring. I
have truck to pull it. Piece by piece I
will be creating – as I live in it – systems that move me off the grid. Probably do a tour of Habitat ReStores,
salvage yards, and Walmart parking lots.
Electric will be tricky until my solar panels are up and the system
connected. And I’ll be using propane –
like most every rural resident these days.
Composting toilet and visiting dump stations for grey water. Libraries for internet, because I need to
stay connected…
See
you on the road!
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