Never throw anything out!
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.”
I enjoyed a current article by @ericvancewalton entitled Building a life of Your Own Conscious Design where he advocates the joys and freedom of minimalism. I had to admit I found the argument wistfully compelling. Maybe someday.
But I'll probably never do that.
I was raised on a farm run by parents and grandparents who had lived through the Great Depression and austere times for generations before that. Their motto was “Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.” So the Family Junk Pile (a.k.a. "The Dump") was an important asset! A stockpile of everything that has absolutely no use but "might come in handy some day". Old washing machines full of belts and motors. A trailer made from the bed of an old pickup. Parts for tire swings and rain barrels and rolls of used hog fence wire that "could probably be untangled if we ever need it." I still remember scrounging in the dump for one of Grandpa Larimer's old Prince Albert Tobacco cans to hold my fishing worms.
That's still in my blood today (to my wife's dismay). If society ever collapses, I'll have my beans, bullets, and bandaids, of course. But even more importantly, I'll have the family stockpile of lost items and forgotten parts. (My wife requires me to keep it all out of her sight "out back" on the "Lower Forty", but that's ok - I built her a "City Girl Barn" where she keeps all her equally useful City Girl treasures.)
I'll leave you with just two compelling examples, that prove my case:
What possible reason is there to keep the parts from an old outdoor staircase?
Well, how about that weekend when your granddaughters suddenly want a treehouse?
And on a much smaller scale, you never know when you're suddenly gonna urgently need parts for your granddaughter's Rube Goldberg project...
Maybe I'll down-size someday. But you can have my Dump when you pry it from my cold dead hands.
Cheers!
About the Author -- Stan Larimer
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Full Disclosure: Last fall I finally agreed to let my wife throw out the 9-track tapes and fan-fold printouts of the 100,000 lines of Fortran '77 code I wrote for my master's thesis in 1978. I'm sure I will suddenly have a need for it any day now.
Exactly, the moment its gone is the moment you need it the most...
Anyone who has been living well within their means is likely to have the wherewithal to acquire some pretty reasonably priced assets when..................
Yeah...that's the Great White Hope for the "Great White Elephant" ;) Do you know where the term "white elephant" came from? Mansions being sold for a dollar in the depths of the Great Depression, because the property taxes & upkeep costs were too damn high. It's was America's "Idle Acres:" it was like the U.K. after WW1 when a vicious deflation saw landed estates come onto the market for a song.
A few people lived well within their means, and did not speculate on real estate or invest in anything other than the bluest chip stocks, all during the "Roaring Twenties". Most other people were partying like it was 1999! They then bought income properties during the Dirty Thirties literally for pennies on the dollar. Fortunes were made during the Great Depression!
Yes, they were.
But just a tip: pennies-on-the-dollar doesn't work very well with modest homes or properties. Back the the Great Depression, some speculators tried that in farm country at repossession or tax sales. The locals made it very clear that such speculators were not welcome. Sometimes, physically.
These days, the "dollar house" likely has a back load of back taxes that have to be paid before you can get a building permit (even to renovate a crumbling structure.) This is the case in Detroit.
That noted, there's nothing wrong with your plan. It would just be prudent to buy a pennies-on-the-dollar place to live on rather than speculate with.
Stan!
I'm thankful today that @ericvancewalton published Building a Life of Your Own Design because it linked me to your response here. Triggering so many things to say to you...
First, I'm from the same school of thought, drilled into me by grandparents who survived The Great Depression... However, I am strongly drawn towards Walton's article and towards cleaning up my life. If I had a large homestead, I would be able to justify a junk-pile out back. In the growing recognition of my mortality (now 66 years old) I am coming to realize that I don't have enough time left to deal with all the "stuff" any more.
My hope (Jesus-granted, eternal life hope) for future enterprises is strong, but for now I need to cut back.
So, I chained off of your article and read your rationale for clinging to Christianity, and Dan's account of falling away... I was saddened by his account yet I share many of his strong feelings about an utterly bankrupt mass of humanity claiming "Christianity" while living in denial of its fundamental principals... sigh... Yet I completely agree with your response that his "logic" is a total non-sequitur. Unlike Dan, I can see the disconnect without (entirely by the kind grace of Jesus, I must add) throwing out the truth that "Christians" disregard.
BTW, my granddaughter and I built a tree house several years ago... and I absolutely delight in Rube Goldberg machines. I suspect I'll be designing and building them forever, among all the other enterprises I so look forward to.
This is turning into an article... so I'll conclude by saying I was glad to "run into you" again, I've learned considerably more about who you are. Looking forward to learning more over time, God willing.
Much appreciated thoughts. I certainly agree that most people are reacting to all the counterfeit Christian teachings. I'm sure that's part of Satan's disinformation plan. Fortunately, those who have been given ears to hear somehow are miraculously able to cut through the clutter. It helps if we actually open the Bible. :)
"My sheep hear My voice
and they follow Me
and I give them eternal life."
God doesn't call us "sheep" for nothing... we're all sheep, most still wandering... I am very thankful to now be one of His sheep! It's good to have a Good Shepherd... :)
Thanks for getting back to me, @stan! BTW, I'm also very intrigued by all the other work you're doing with blockchain. I have for some time wanted to get more involved in that space. I'm particularly interested in distributed organizations that have no nexus with human governments... I suspect that, as I learn more and proceed further in directions that I'm already going, I'll be "pinging" you and seeking to benefit from your guidance... ;)
Good post @stan! Those people of the Depression-era were true survivors. Ingenuity was a part of everyday life to them, out of necessity. My father instilled a lot of that philosophy into my brother and I. I like to own things that are of quality and can be repaired. I have a Merkur safety razor that was designed in 1909 and that item alone has saved me almost $1k over the past seven years in disposable multi-blades. My bike is a ’59 Raleigh 3-speed and everything, down to the peddles, can be taken apart and repaired.
Nice! I didn't know you had an affection for prepping.
Yeah, on any given day I might be planting clover, teaching Sunday School, or designing mile-long tubes to launch payloads to low earth orbit. Did I mention BitShares?
Yes, you've mentioned BitShares. ;)
Aaah a fellow pack-rat.
Well, I guess for me the questions relies on the availability of resources around me vs. what i want to thrive for and with within the realm of what I can foresee in eventualities/potentialities as well as reality. You have a lot more than I have and an awful lot more to take care of than I do, it makes sense to me that you do keep quite a few different resources nearby, close at hand, for any unsuspected beautiful surprises such as the impromptu treehouse. Good for you, good for them and good for us all. All for one and one for all! Namaste :)
heh, nice. It can be an interesting challenge, knowing what to toss and what to stash. Having moved from a 5 br house to a 2 br one, we're finding that there are a lot of things we'd rather do without these days... often because they're either in the way or we haven't seen them since they got boxed.