Out Of The Woodwork

Like I stated back when I first started this blog, I always thought that this “commune” or homestead project or whatever you want to call it idea was always a bit out there.  Until a couple of years ago, I didn’t know anyone who was even interested in growing vegetables much less moving to the middle of nowhere a living a simpler lifestyle.  I’d always posed the question to friends, “Hey do you want to come and join our oddball scheme?” to which most would chuckle and say, “surrrrre” assuming that either it would never happen or when it did they could back out.  I really believed that Holly, the kids and I would be living out in the hills of Tennessee somewhere by ourselves because no one else was a crazy as we are to uproot our family and move to a foreign land.

Well the good news is that there are other crazies out there.  It really took me by surprise when Gary called me and asked, “How serious are you about this Commune thing”.  We’re serious.  We’re getting more and more serious every day.  Every time I start to think about how we’ll leave this house one day I long for a since of history in my home.  Every time I think about what we are doing with a quarter acre I think about what I could do with 10, 20, 100 acres.  When I hear about crime, about the failures of public schools, the influence of media, I think about a place where I can raise my children with values and around people of my choosing.  I want to go, NOW!

But like I said, very few people were willing do to this same thing, right?  The more we tell people about our dreams, the more like-minded people we find.  Gary really wasn’t a stretch, but my Mom wanting to join us was.  My friend Haley and her husband want to come and are even raising chickens and pigs (so jealous!).  Friends from at least 5 different states have expressed serious intrestest in joining us (though I have to say I’m still on the skeptical side).  Even beyond that, we’re finding people with the same dream.  Out of the blue, Holly “met” a family living near us who is persuing the same plan of one day homesteading and is actually further along than us.  I talk to people at work that I’ve known for years and they tell me about their chickens, their life growing up on the farm, their gardens and their desire to live more simply.  I’m just amazed at how many people in my generation are actually looking back at the way our forefathers lived and are envious.  I had no idea that we were not alone.