Being Poor and Living Well

Being poor has it's benefits. Learning survival tactics is one them. I knew I was going to remain poor due to a health condition. I was a single parent as well and did not receive child support. I opted to live in the country instead of the city because it would be easier to provide for my children if I had room for a garden, could hunt or have others hunt for me. I found a place on a very clean creek full of brown trout. The house was in a clearing in the woods. Enough room for a large garden and room to plant a small orchard. There were wild blackberries, raspberries, white oyster mushrooms, fiddleheads, leeks, wild carrots, and many wild medicinal plants.

Chief Gasco of the Ottawa taught me many things not the least of which was the easy way to tan hides. I learned to make rawhide, use all the body parts of an animal, how to garden organically, how to keep critters away from my stashes without harming them. So many things.

I took out the gas fireplace and installed a woodburning stove. I had one in the pole barn too. I dried food from the garden and stored it in glass jars. I used it all in rotation. We raised chickens completely free range and organic. Raised rabbits too.

We had electricity but I made sure we could survive off the grid by making candles, having oil lamps, and solar lights which could be brought indoors during a power outage...of which there were many. just about any time it rained our power would go out. I had solar/crank radios and flashlights, solar battery chargers. Yah I was poor but I made a point to use at least 10 bucks a month and put it toward survival gear.

My kids knew the drill when it rained and immediately would start filling water jugs, bringing in the solar lights, etc. I was very proud of my kids. They knew how to do all the things that I did and knew how to survive. They knew how to do laundry by hand, and how to build safe fires, how to find food in the woods, how to gut an animal..everything.

The towns people thought I was bit nuts...until the big storm. One morning we had a tornado rip through. It landed a tree on my van, completely blocked us from the main roads. There were several families who lived out by us and we were all trapped. The tornado had thrown my power pole and done extensive damage. One neighbor had a patch of woods behind his house that looked like the Tunguska blast. The tornadoes had ravaged the county that night and nobody for 40 miles had power. After a few days, and they had at least cleared the roads and people were driving into town to the Red Cross tent to get meals. A lot of people had to leave and visit relatives because they had no heat, food, power, water. My kids and I had everything. We were off the grid and knew how to live off the grid entirely. We had enough food stocked for a year at least. We had heat and light. Water. Phone because I had a land line with an old fashioned non electric phone on it. We even had radio. It was about 3 weeks before everyone got their power back. Most had done thier day living in the Red Cross tent. Not us. Our life went on as usual.

If there was a ever a major disaster... my kids and I would have survived it....and this is coming from a crippled poor chick. If we could do it, you can too. Learn survival.