One year from that post I was in Toccoa, Georgia, chopping my way through BG’s land with a machete and a heavy head, thinking as I chopped. This is abnormal work. And there is nothing here but us, machetes and thorns everywhere… for 50 acres.
The air was crisp and the sun was warm, and at night all we could hear was everything nature-made. I want to say it was a tough few days because we had the bare minimum equipment and camping gear, and the fire ants got to the food (and to me), we sweat a lot because it was still quite warm out and we had long sleeves and pants on… and no showers for four days. The chopping was tough, for hours on end, and when we would turn around to see our work there we saw just fifty feet of a trail that took us three hours to work on.
I mean, it started out that tough, for me anyway. I was afraid, actually. Afraid that this was too much labor and that I might just be a little bit lazy and a little too weak. Am I committed enough to this person and these ideas to see it through and keep a level head?
What we are essentially doing is saying a big “fuck that” to what the majority of our society is doing and inevitably we have endless questions: How much money do we need to build this house? Can we actually build this ourselves? Is it ok if we don’t work for a year to do this full-time? How long before we can start the farm? How are we going to be affected if the stock market crashes? What happens if we need to go to the hospital? We will have no insurance… Where can we place the house for maximum solar exposure (for the panels), and how can we find that place when the land is such a mess? How sustainable are we if we hire someone to come in with a machine to clear some of this brush? Have we thought of everything?
Endless.
So there’s me, chopping my way through, over analyzing everything. And along comes the BG, curing my pain, silencing my thoughts and clarifying everything… by asking me to marry him.
Yeh. ;)
