Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Living Simple…

I am getting older now but I still feel like a young buck even though there is white in my beard. I’m not old by any means but I have noticed things starting to change, my body is still healthy and strong but it is starting to show some signs of wear and tear from younger days of neighborhood football, fist fights, and car crashes. But what I notice changing the most is where I have settled in with who I am. I have been a lot of things in this life while I have been trying to find out who I actually am. I have been a scraggly, scared coke bottled glasses kid. I have been a fighter from birth. I have been a tough guy with a chip on his shoulder. I have been a wannabe wiseguy. I have been a brawler. I have been hot headed and mean spirited. I have been that guy that yells “Freebird” at concerts.

Yes, I have been many, many things along this path I call my life, but as I get older I just want things to be simpler. I look at my life and feel incredibly blessed. I am a husband a father of two beautiful girls. I am successful in what I do for a living. I know I have it good and I know that L Bird has had a hand in making me want to be a better person. Who I am now just craves a simpler time when families stuck together and were more self sufficient. I have slowly been taking steps towards living more simply and doing more for myself and not relying on big business or the government to “help me along”. It’s not much, it’s small things but the small things add up. The past few years L Bird and I have planted a garden and have been starting to can our own stuff. If you are a regular reader of this blog you know I have a small flock of chickens that keeps my family and friends well supplied with eggs. I find that there is a lot of peace to be found in gardening and animal husbandry. Yes there is hard work involved in turning the soil and weeding during the season but there is something so satisfying when you taste that tomato from your garden that you have planted and nurtured through the whole year. It tastes like nothing you’ve ever tasted from the grocery store. The same goes for keeping chickens, there is such pleasure in watching a flock of chickens grow from fuzzy little balls of fluff to mature chickens that produce food for your table. Some of the most peaceful times I have are when I am watching the chickens work the garden or when I squat down to pick something up and they all come running to me because they think I have a grub to throw to them. These are truly simple pleasures that help soothe my soul as well as feed me and my family.

The older I get the more I realize I want to be a farmer or a homesteader or whatever the hell you call it these days. It’s hard work and long hard hours but at the end of the day you feel how tired and sore your body is and you know that you put in a an honest days’ work. I want to be Old Man Schrader that owns a flock of hens and a few goats. I want to be that guy that grows a huge garden and works a few fruit trees. I want to be that guy that can sit on the front porch in the evening with a cigar that can share advice and a mug of homebrew with friends. I want to just be content with being outside and watching the stars with my wife and girls. I want to be that guy who is willing to give you a hand with no thoughts of payment or reward.

So that’s my plan if we ever sell our house. I am going to work the land, raise some animals and enjoy a country life with my family. I know that this sort of hokey now since last year’s super bowl but I had heard this long before that and I still think Paul Harvey says it best.

 

Enjoy!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...