How No Electricity is A Reminder That Self-Sufficiency is Important

The other day, our electricity went out; luckily, we have a wood stove on the back porch.

Views in Jericó

For me, cooking on a woodstove brings back memories of growing up. We only had a wood stove for cooking and heating. Still, many countries worldwide rely on wood stoves, which most of us refer to as the ¨old cooking¨ style.

I do not see it this way; I see it as the forgotten art of cooking. Most of our ancestors cooked on wood; they had to chop and cut enough to make it through the winter, especially those of you who live in cold climates with snow.

I travel to countries that still live in ways that many of those from the US might think are behind the times; a lot of technology has created laziness, and we have stopped doing the basic things in life.

Fire is survival; to make a fire is a basic skill that most can no longer do.

To make a fire in a wood stove to make breakfast, basic living. I started making a fire on the stove when I was around five years old, a skill that will never disappear.

Cooking outside is often reserved for cookouts and has now evolved into a gas grill or charcoal that we throw lighter fluid on. Can you cook just on the ground, with a match and twigs, maybe some paper to help ignite?

Many think you can only make hotdogs and hamburgers when you cook outside. I went camping in the Andes mountains in Argentina, and the hosts cooked pizza, empanadas, steaks, and anything you can imagine outside on a stove they made from what was nearby.

Nothing fancy, basics. Survival basics.

Sometimes, my family thinks I have lost my marbles, and maybe I have. The fact that I like to survive with as little as possible fulfills me and brings me more joy than turning on a button for heat or fire.

When we had to cook outside, in my head, I thought, this is how I want to cook when I have a house; no matter where my home is, I will use the traditional ways of cooking.

Everything we now have in our kitchen is for convenience, to make our life faster, where we can hit a button, grab a cup of coffee, and run out the door to where we sit in traffic on our way to work.

Is this what the world has become: fast food, fast service, fast living?

I do not like living in the fast lane, at least not anymore.

What is wrong with waiting for things to happen or to eat? Even if it takes longer, the longer it takes, the more I enjoy or appreciate it.

I do not want to live a fast, cheap, and easy life, so much so that I am in a reversal stage. I want to learn to use my hands more, even know the ancient art of making things from scratch, and actually learning how to make things instead of just buying.

A major problem with the world is that no one knows where anything comes from anymore. Ask someone where their wool sweater came from, and they will tell you the store at the mall.

Instead of from the sheep who allowed the man to sheer him, and then created thread, and used a machine (of course, I do not know the name) and then made it into a beautiful sweater that someone bought and sold to you.

I was in an artisanal market in Tunja a few months ago and saw the incredible process from sheep to selling. I, of course, instantly said I wanted to make myself a sweater out of sheep wool; I might settle for a hand-crocheted sweater only because this area of Colombia is not cold enough for sheep shearing, but still.

The point is that I do not want to contribute to a society that is collapsing because we have forgotten how to do anything.

Do I know how to crochet? Absolutely not, did my mother and her mother, yes. Can I learn? Absolutely, yes.

What is the point?

Part of changing the world is changing how you see the world and things, and even doing one small thing works. Only control what you can control in your everyday life.

The other day, I planted coffee seeds, to hopefully grow a coffee tree; why? Because I want to make my coffee from bean to cup. Will it take time? Yes, years, but I want to do it.

Eventually, I want only to use what I have made. A learning curve: yes, using the wood stove only reinforced this. One day re-learning the ancient art of letter writing as a form of communication vs. typing it all here.

Who knows, all I know is that I have to start small. Start with not shopping and learning how to make one thing at a time, not all at once. My brain always wants to do it all, I know that is impossible.

XOXO

S

https://youtube.com/shorts/uFT-2s4It-Y?si=rc63MdCOCn9P5bzJ