By: Jennifer Richardson Holt
I am rural folk. I live in a place where I wake up in the morning and, instead of hearing traffic and the hustle and bustle of society, I hear roosters and songbirds waking up and, occasionally after a wild and crazy night, the final cries of coyotes. I am probably far more likely to have an accident in my car with a deer than with another vehicle. Cows, hay, and acres of untouched forest are the norm for me.
And while I am undeniably rural, I am coming to learn that I am apparently not country.
I’ve been seeing a lot of people as of late who call themselves homesteaders. I love the idea of raising all your own food and making your own bread. The idea of nurturing animals and having fields of crops that provide food for your family is a lovely and noble concept. I know there was a time when, other than those who lived in larger cities, that was simply how most people lived. This was especially true here in the South. Most of my parents’ generation and those before them had what we would today call a farm that the whole family worked. It was just what most everyone did.
Now, I am not saying people in the 1940s and 1950s were inherently making their own bread or throwing clay to make plates to eat from. But they did grow their vegetables and raise their animals. I know that in both my parents’ cases, they even made some of their own clothes, especially dresses for the girls. This was simply the standard way of life.
I like the self-sufficiency of it all; however, I am afraid that while I adore living far from the city—or even a small town, if we’re honest—I cannot say I have the desire to become one of these homesteading folk. I have been ruined by things such as air conditioning and fully stocked grocery stores.
While I admit I do get most of my eggs from a dear friend who has chickens (and very well-producing ones at that), I can’t say I find a great deal of appeal in having a coop and birds and all the residual bird materials that come with them. Do I like chickens? Yes. Some are absolutely lovely. And quite frankly, I cannot hear a rooster crow without thinking about my Granny, who often had them, and I adore the reminiscence of it.
I also love yard eggs and am more than happy to have ready access to them. But let’s face it: when—or if—I do not have such resources, the grocery store will serve me just fine. Well, other than me needing to refinance my house to shop there.
I have even had gardens on several occasions, and fresh vegetables that I have grown are great to enjoy. But it’s not really just a plant, wait, harvest, and eat process as one likes to think. If that were how it worked, I’d likely have a garden every year. No expensive produce for me.
But that isn’t how it works.
There is planting and fertilizing and watering. Then, when your garden produces and you realize you have planted entirely too much and there is no conceivable way that you can eat that much fresh squash and banana peppers, you have to put in all the effort to figure out how to preserve everything. The task of bagging and freezing—or, even more tediously, canning—is not for the impatient.
Not to mention that your friends and family only want so many grocery bags of vegetables because then you have simply passed along the preservation chore to them along with your produce. Fresh vegetables are the gift that gives too much in that way.
I do adore nature and being in it. I love walking through beautiful forests and rolling hills. In thinking about it, the best way to describe it is that I love the land.
I simply don’t want to have to live off it.
It is a simple way of life. You work for and produce everything you need. But it is also not at all a simple way of life because you have to work for and produce everything you need.
Watching these people make sourdough starters for a continuous supply of homemade bread or show their expansive pantries full of colorful jars does strike a certain amount of admiration in me. The industriousness of these people is not lost on me, and I am impressed by their tenacity and work ethic. As one who is both very attached to creature comforts and, if I am brutally honest, prone to sloth, the amount of work such things entail boggles my mind.
While I love living a rural life surrounded by all the farming and animals, I have come to the conclusion that I am not so much looking to build a homestead but, quite simply, to build a steady home.
Prose and Possibilities 