"E"lectricity or Why I Can't Go Off the Grid

Electricity is such a blessing and a bane in our lives. It gives us light, let's us wash our clothes in a washing machine in the house rather than down in the river. It, though not here where wood stoves rule, lets us have heat, or depending on where you live, air conditioning, both keeping us climate controlled and comfortable. We have a more reliable device to cook on than the wood stove. We can have our cell phones, iPads, television and computers too. It lets us keep our food safer and longer. We can run our lawn mowers, trimmers, drills, saws, recharge our batteries, and even run our cars. It makes our pump work, giving me water, giving me the ability to flush a toilet. It's easy to take it for granted when it just works. But let it go out and the average person gets a little panicky.

Electricity is a bane as well. That old double edged sword. Because we have light 24 hours a day, we are no longer governed by our natural circadian rhythms. We stay up too late and get up too early because of the hectic pace of life. We have to ability to "go" anywhere at night because we need to be doing something that doesn't involve staying home... that's boring and does not entertain us enough. Stores are open, the movies are playing, there are concerts, clubs, bowling, and of course, restaurants to eat in so you don't have to cook. There is so much to do after you finish at work, you job being entirely dependent on electricity, that we don't get together as families to eat before the sun goes down...

I have often considered going off the grid. Him and I have talked about it at length, what it would entail and if I could really do it. Going off the grid isn't an unusual thing here in Western Montana, it's not terribly common, but there are enough people living that way that there are stores dedicated to living off the grid. There are entire towns in Montana that are off the grid. If you don't know what off the grid means, it is to be somewhere that has no civilized services. Electricity, phones, wells, important things like that. Just about every appliance you can think of can be converted to run on propane. Refrigerator, stove, lights. But, propane can't, make electricity (except with a propane generator which is only 10% efficient). We could buy a wind generator and a few hundred batteries to store it, for a gabillion dollars and generate your own electricity. We could have high end solar panels to heat your water, and possibly your house. We would have to buy cisterns and either take them somewhere to fill them, have someone come fill it, or catch rain water. Where I live, you would need to have a number of cisterns and catch as much rain as we can during the one maybe two months that we have any substantial rain. We could get a bike, rig it up the right way, and ride it when we need electricity, or again, store what we make in batteries, which won't be all that much. This would never work for me, I can't ride a bike to the corner and back, so him would have to do all the electricity generation. We would have to have a composting toilet. All our grey water would be drained out into the garden. The work of providing sustenance for ourselves would be hard work. Taking care of our meat on the hoof, growing a garden, hunting every year for what meat you don't raise ourselves.

In the days before electricity everything that was done was done with purpose. Either feeding yourself, preparing for winter, maintaining your shelter or using what extra you had to barter for what you didn't. You would spend the time growing food, making food for the table, canning food to put in the pantry or food cellar for winter, growing livestock, getting wood gathered, split and stacked so you could stay warm all winter. It's a lot of work, hard work. Which is why people who lived or now live this way are ready for bed when it got dark. Off the grid means spending a little time together reading, knitting, mending, preparing for the next day, talking about the day to the light of lanterns before it is time to go to bed. Lather, Rinse, Repeat. Every day, the same.

I would like to go off the grid. I don't like neighbors. No matter how neighborly or how unfriendly. I don't like neighbors close enough to see their house. I don't like hearing their alarm go off at 6:00 AM all year long when my windows are open. I don't like hearing their dogs bark. I don't like my dog barking and bothering them. I am annoyed that their yard looks like an auto salvage yard. And I loath hearing the highway noise. But the single most important reason I couldn't go off the grid now? I couldn't charge my iPad or use my computer. I am chained to these two devices. And I don't know what would happen to Dimples if she didn't have the iPod to play with, it's possible the earth would crash into the sun. All my books are on the iPad. I get all my information off the internet. They have solar chargers for phones, iPads and iPods now. Lay the solar pad in the sun, put an adapter on your electronic, lay it on the charger pad. That's brilliant. But you wouldn't be able to use a computer, even if you could generate enough electricity to power it, because you would have no phone or cable to provide internet access. It would be a huge paper weight.

You may ask why? Why would anyone want to give up the conveniences of modern living? My reasons, besides the ones already stated, which I realize are all negative, families worked together. They depended on every single body in the family to work for their survival. There is less "stuff" to be attached to. I could go back to paper books. I would lose my games... but I wouldn't have time for them anyway. Maybe Dimples would start playing with non-electronic toys, start reading paper books as well. It's possible without TV and computer, there would be more time actually spent in the same room with people you love. I think about how excited the world was when electricity began to roll out across the world, knowing it would make their lives so much better, so much easier! Little did they know that the magnificent inventions that followed the advent of electricity would change the very fabric of humanity.

So, sometimes I fantasize about going off the grid. Being different than we are now. That very romantic notion suits my hermit personality well. The harsh realities of being off the grid does notsuit my iPad toting, internet surfing, hot bath taking, lazy self. At.All. So... I will continue to to occasionally dream and talk about running away to the mountains somewhere to live off the grid. Then come back to reality and go take a hot bath in my warm bathroom while I'm running a load of laundry and have the crock pot simmering the meat I took out of the freezer knowing this is an easier life and appreciating it greatly. Maybe it would be easier to buy a house that has a few acres and no neighbors.



Are you a social butterfly or would you like to be an off the grider?