Sunday, April 23, 2017

A place where nobody wants to leave

 

I have made a discovery. There does, indeed, exist a place where nobody wants to leave. It is possible to breathe there without worrying about what you are inhaling. This place is not infested with joggers or 300-pound shoulder-strap radios, and when you’re driving along and meet another car or truck on the road, that other driver is very likely to wave at you. You, of course, wave back. This is called courtesy.

As I write this in my office, located in the “Uptown” area of a major Southern city, I am contemplating my upcoming marriage and subsequent move to the Cloud’s Creek area of Saluda County, South Carolina, an entirely rural county populated by chickens, pine trees and a rugged breed of country folk. Many of my friends consider this marriage, at age 32, a sudden and surprising move, especially when they find out that I’ll be an instant father to three children, ages 11, 7 and 5.

6 comments:

  1. The only negative is the expected income is lower. There are a lot of costs to modern life.

    Just to mention: Tesla is developing/has developed solar roof tiles that look like a normal roof: https://www.tesla.com/solarroof

    And Tesla sells batteries for one's house. So you could actually live entirely off the grid now, albeit at a cost.

    Costs should decline for such things over time, but I'd love to have a roof like that, provided it's truly durable.

    Tesla markets itself as saving the planet, but it should market itself as offering independence. And an investment in solar offers a fairly certain return, even if a low return.

    Anyway, I love that idea of complete independence, assuming a person had a septic tank, filtered well water, and a plug-in hybrid car that's cheaper than a Tesla... Lots of dollar signs. Anyway, independence is a nice ideal.

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    1. a septic tank

      The Vietnamese(I had one made in Can Tho in 1993) simply dig a rectangular hole, insert stakes in the bottom which hold the solid waste in place and make a drain that take the liquids off a way. Works fine and is very inexpensive.

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      filtered well water

      It is not necessary to filter though that it is easy if you like. I have two wells at Dixieland and the water from them is sparking clear and more tasteful than the crap from the city water in Cape Carteret.

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    2. Complete independence is an outhouse, a spring and a bicycle.

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    3. I love spring water, but I would want a well on top of that, even two if you are in an area where they go dry at times, though Dixieland isn't in one of those.

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      a septic tank

      The Vietnamese(I had one made in Can Tho in 1993) simply dig a rectangular hole, insert stakes in the bottom which hold the solid waste in place and make a drain that take the liquids off a way. Works fine and is very inexpensive.

      I forgot, they also run a pipe to release the odors above the house.

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  2. Sounds like home and a great place to live. As long as I and my children are alive, the stories and legends of Southern pioneers, heroes, and heroines will also be alive.

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