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At 10:00 26/05/98 -0700, you wrote:
> ...
>My husband and I both descend from hard-scrabble farmers, and we can
>easily remember houses with no electricity or indoor plumbing. We grew
>up on tales about washdays over a boiling kettle in the yard
> ...
>I feel blessed that I can have a refrigerator, stove, washer and plumbing.
>
> ... Diane
>
** (David, catching up on old mail)
Diane: In Canada (eastern Ontario) in the early '40s we had a two-hole
long-drop into a deep crack in the Laurentian Shield, and in the winter put
on a heavy coat & hood, & took the kerosene storm lantern, to make tracks
through the snow to go the ~150 ft. to the toilet.
At 10, I came to New Zealand and remember getting up early on Saturday
morning (wash-day) to go to the wash-house to start the fire under the old
copper (able to hold ~3 washing-machine loads), after running rainwater
into it from the tank. (We are still living on rainwater, in Greenhithe.)
After it had reached close to boiling-point, I'd munge it with a smooth
stick, then lift out the steaming items to put through the wringer.
Bera and I will be retiring soon to a farm (a tiny Intentional Community),
and she's planning our house, which involves deciding what is the minimum
she needs, to be satisfied living there for a few decades.
Our choice includes the modern electrically-efficient washing machine we
bought a few months ago (we'll be living off the electricity grid,
generating all our own power, using solar panels), a chest freezer set to
work as a frig, LP gas hob and wood stove for cooking (also heating when
necessary - seldom, I'm guessing), and an indoor composting toilet, the
twice-a-year clearings-out to go in the main compost heap and then on the
garden and around the fruit and nut trees.
So, yes, things have improved since the second world war.
So they should, with all the unsustainable exploitation of resources that
results from the current economic system. See Keith Rankin's:
http://pl.net/~keithr/rf_shorts.html
I think this professional economist is learning from observing my life.
"Living lightly on the Earth"
David.
** http://www.geocities.com/RainForest/6783/
David MacClement <davd@geocities.com> and <d_macclement@yahoo.co.nz>
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/3142/