This is a good question and one that I feel is apt to answer in the kicking off of this blog.
It's funny to me to think back to where Jon and I started. We were young, smart, vivacious, over-eager twenty somethings yearning to leave our mark. The chosen path - the games industry. That's how we met. Jon was head of a games studio at the time and I was a domineering pain-in-the-ass games producer who wanted to be one of the guys, but also, had career aspirations to do something spectacular in a field that was at the time very male-centric. I also wanted to be well-liked which often times didn't gel well with doing something spectacular. After a short bout at said work place, we set up an independent games company where we learned a lot of life's hard lessons including the one about never working with friends and family. Determined not to wreck our budding relationship I went off to pursue my own path and left the industry all together.
Seven years later, here we are. Married homeowners with two dogs and too many books (so Jon says). And we now live back in the US, which frankly was a huge culture shock for me especially having lived in England for the last 10 years.
One thing we noticed coming back here was that things seemed too good to be true. It was 2005, house prices were off the scale, the stock market was ticking along nicely thank you very much, and people were consuming like nobody's business. Three car garages and McMansion houses had become the norm. People spent all their time watching TV, driving their kids to soccer practice, online in chat rooms, but no one was talking to one another. There seemed to be a break down in community spirit and awareness. Everybody was too busy consuming to really notice.
Until the economic rug was pulled out from underneath all that debt. Yep, as predicted, the housing bubble was bursting, foreclosures were on the rise, people started to lose jobs, and I got to know the term subprime mortgage very well. Hell, you couldn't pick up a paper or turn on the news without hearing about it. All of a sudden, America was in crisis and it was down to all those poor people who should've known better than to take out a loan that they couldn't afford. Wow. Talking about kicking the American public when they're down. So it had nothing to do with the fat cats on Wall Street who incentivized those people to take loans so they could reap big benefits then? Hmmm. I was perplexed.
What was clear to us was that it wasn't going to get better any time soon so we needed to make a plan and fast. Some friends laughed and some thought we were a bit nuts talking about wood stoves, water purifiers, MREs, generators, and hand guns. Well, even I was skeptical about the hand gun and put my foot down. If things really went to hell in a handbasket last thing I needed was to accidentally shoot myself trying to protect my property and supplies. But the other things did kind of make sense if I thought through the implications of where the economy was heading and while embarrassed to talk it up with friends, Jon and I slowly started implementing our plans.
For starters, we bought a property on 1.5 acres situated between two towns and within relatively easy distance of prime shops, but far enough away that we wouldn't be directly effected by anything that may erupt in the middle of a city. We also went about clearing part of the land in order to have passive solar heating, but also to make space for edible landscaping. We installed a wood stove, changed all lights to CFLs, bought energy efficient appliances, installed a gas stove on propane, added multiple water barrels, and of course bought the MREs (thanks Dad!). Many more things happened as well, but I won't bore you with the details.
So where does this leave us?
I started this blog for two reasons:
- To document all of our efforts to be self-sustaining in times of crisis
- To educated those around us to what's happening in the world and why preparing for crisis and being involved in a community is important
As a society, we have become too lax in our attitude towards our well-being. We'd rather spend $150 bucks on a pair of sneakers made in a sweatshop in China than use that money as an investment in our future or community. For that amount of money you could:
- Buy all the seeds you'd need to feed your family for a year
- Take a class on vegetable gardening, wood working, orchard planting
- You could make 3 rain barrels for your house that could hold up to 160 gallons of usable water
- You could replace your old leaky toilet with a water efficient one
- You could buy a half cord of wood for a wood stove
I could go on and on. And I probably will in this blog. But don't worry, I won't be debbie downer all the time. Honestly. This self-sustaining business is actually pretty fun.
My final word on the induction of the small suburban farm:
Don't be scared to join the revolution. It isn't just for hippies after all.
