Wednesday, February 18

DIY and BWO, maybe I am a lazy snob?

while puttering around the blog block, I found some jems to share.
Mental Multivitamin and from there; Semicolon.
and this... which tickled my funny bone and took the pressure out of something that was suppose to be fun in the first place, and then turned into a chore that I was skillfully avoiding. But now, with my new BWO mantra, it just might be fun again.
What started this little treasure hunt?
Why, I was googling ( I just Googled google-ing to make sure that was the right way to say it, HA!) a quote from The Hours to see if it was something that was from Virginia Wolf or just from the movies interpretation of her. She says "I choose not the suffocating anesthetic of the suburbs, but the violent jolt of the Capital..." And I thought it was so poetic and pin pointed how I feel about urban life, my urban life, that I wanted to know more...
I have noticed a trend with a lot of my friends and family towards 'getting off the grid', homeschooling, homesteading,DIY, etc. and while I admire it for many reasons, I have to say I am confused by it as well. It often seems paired with a distaste for cities. It seems like a distrust of people, and a need to retreat. I am all for the DIY ethic, but what is your time worth? For example making your own bullion, which I read recently someone I know was doing. If it's only 2 dollars in the store, but takes you all day to make...? Is that the best use of your brain, and multiple talents? and I know we pooh-pooh at people who have the gardeners, housekeepers, etc. but if you were free from scrubbing the tub, and in turn helping support a small business (your dog walker, for instance), is it really that bad? I guess my point is what would you be doing, if you were free to be doing it? 2 more hours a day to dance, paint, write that book? I am not in that position yet, so I am going to scrub my tub. But you can bet your butt that my work ethic won't disappear when I can afford to have someone else scrub it for me. I will just have a clean tub AND time to go skip rocks with my husband. or blog. I realize that I am making a value judgment as to what it right for my time, so don't be offended if you are into making dehydrated goodies for your family in your spare time.For those that have the courage to start their own small businesses making soap or baking bread, need patrons too.I think I am just fascinated about where we draw the lines with our money and our time, aren't you?
A little poetry, a little art, and a lot of random.