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Thread: Maybe I should have been a pioneer woman

  1. #31
    Senior Member Teacher Terry's Avatar
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    My grandma talked about using cloths for your period and having to launder them. Yuck((:. I remember when housework was a full time job with wringer washers, no dryers, having to iron even the sheets since they would be too wrinkled to sleep in. Ironing was a entire days work. No thanks.

  2. #32
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    My paternal grandmother died at a young age from massive burns when the paraffin she was melting for canning caught on fire over the wood stove. Life was short and brutal for many.

  3. #33
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    I think the full pioneer package of hostile natives, malnutrition, unrelenting drudgery and untreatable disease would not be very appealing to most of us effete moderns. I in fact suspect that much of human progress has been driven by people looking for ways to escape that existence. It may sometimes be a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there. I like a nice fire, but I wouldn’t want my life to depend on stockpiling enough fuel to survive the winter.

  4. #34
    Senior Member catherine's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by LDAHL View Post
    I wouldn’t want my life to depend on stockpiling enough fuel to survive the winter.
    I know. I'm surprised I love it as much as I do. I think it has to do with such a simple equation: outputs=inputs * attention. Overconsumption starts when you lose a grasp of what goes into what houses you, heats you and feeds you. When you have a garden, it's amazing how much less you are willing to waste a home-grown cucumber than one you pulled off the shelf in a supermarket. I choose the log that's going to keep me warmest longest. I don't have a steady stream of fossil fuel succumbing to my every whim while I complain that it's cold--72 degrees, and tell Alexa to turn up the thermostat. There's a direct relationship between commodity and comfort when you're living off the direct heat of a cord of wood. My VT neighbors go one step further and spend a couple of weeks in October felling a couple of trees to heat their family. I'll never get to that point. That's why I said I wish I had 20 more years. I may have 20 more years, but if I were 47 and not 67, I may be out there chopping my own wood.

    ETA: Also, I find it more rewarding to build a fire, and moderate the humidity in the room with the cast iron skillet filled with water on the stove with cinnamon sticks thrown in than churning out market research reports for pharmaceutical companies.
    PLUS.. Maybe it's the just the Aries in me that appreciates being a fire starter.


    ETA2: I'm off to dress up in my winter gear to go out and hang up my clean clothes on the line. It's partly sunny, 22 degrees, and a good wind off the lake--great conditions for drying.
    "Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?" Emily Webb, Our Town
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  5. #35
    Senior Member rosarugosa's Avatar
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    Catherine: Are you staying in VT for the winter this year? I thought that wasn't going to be until next year?

  6. #36
    Senior Member catherine's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by rosarugosa View Post
    Catherine: Are you staying in VT for the winter this year? I thought that wasn't going to be until next year?
    We're leaving mid-December until March to stay in a furnished rental in NJ in order to visit grandsons/DS/DIL, but we have both decided that next year, we're staying here. It's not as bad as we thought it would be (so far).
    "Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?" Emily Webb, Our Town
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  7. #37
    Senior Member razz's Avatar
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    Catherine, maybe the difference is that this is all new for you to experience. The novelty does disappear soon enough although the values may not change. Enjoy!

    DH always enjoyed the routine of looking for the trees that needed culling, sawing, cutting, reducing them to suitable sized logs for the fireplace and airtight stove, stacking them in the shed for our winter supply. The logs needed to dry out for a year at least. We used two old wooden carts to haul the wood from our woodlot to the shed, load enough for a week stored in the garage and downstairs. After his passing, the job was mine and I used up the stash that he prepared over the two years on my own hauling it all inside.
    As Cicero said, “Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others.”

  8. #38
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    We had two wood stoves when we lived in upstate NY. I could cull our 65 acres of woods for the deadfall and keep warm that way, although I remember one time being snowed in and sick and alone and burning furniture to stay warm.

    It was a little scary in that house.

  9. #39
    Senior Member rosarugosa's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by catherine View Post
    We're leaving mid-December until March to stay in a furnished rental in NJ in order to visit grandsons/DS/DIL, but we have both decided that next year, we're staying here. It's not as bad as we thought it would be (so far).
    This sounds like a nice way to sample it without committing to the entire winter the first time around. Good plan!

  10. #40
    Senior Member iris lilies's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by pinkytoe View Post
    My paternal grandmother died at a young age from massive burns when the paraffin she was melting for canning caught on fire over the wood stove. Life was short and brutal for many.
    My paternal great great grandmother died in similar fashion, in a household fire event.

    What was interesting is that we heard this story decades ago from a non-relative, someone who was doing genealogy research and who said she read an account of the fire in a local parish newspaper. The story came to our ears as “ Mrs. Stuart died in a barn fire. She was living in the barn with her children and she threw them all out of the loft to safety before succumbing to the fire herself.”

    For decades my cousin attempted to find this newspaper story, and finally did find it, only the event wasn't as dramatic as the tale we had been told. Her garment caught on fire in a (probably parafin) accident and she died a few days later.

    We had always wondered why she was living in the barn anyway, and assumed the nogoodnik great great grandfather had abandoned her and the children.
    p.s. We couldn't get family history from our family because they were tight lipped. I suspect alcoholism, but ya never know.

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