Sitting on the shore of a remote isle in the Pacific Northwest, where scrub oak and madrone tumble from the hills to the high water line, and residents ferry to their chosen isolated lifestyle, we’re thinking of alternatives to our traditional American way. Here, we feel at once the slowing of island time and the awareness of lost immediacy. There is the comfort of self-dependence, the forced inaccessibility, the certain confidence in ones ability to accept, and find the freedom in, the limitations. For the effort, we are greatly and naturally rewarded.
Though it was instinctual at the time, I know why we chose remoteness, challenges and self-sufficiency in the 70s: the satisfaction and low impact of paying attention to every cause and effect. Before debates over climate change and resource depletion, it felt good to take only our share.
it definitely is a heck of a lot easier to see the cause and effect when you have to deal with all of your own trash, make your own food, drive so much farther to a store, etc. etc. puts it all in a different light...
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