4 ms·

This. My father also has a farm, and I did a ton of manual labor until my mid-20s. It has zero romantic appeal to me, and I'm always amused by office workers th

This. My father also has a farm, and I did a ton of manual labor until my mid-20s. It has zero romantic appeal to me, and I'm always amused by office workers that idealize rural living. For one thing, manual labor is incredibly mindless and repetitive. I am now a very comfortable urban dweller, and happy to not even have to shovel my front walk. I miss absolutely none of this lifestyle. On the political front, I find idealizing farmers obnoxious because it's mostly a taxpayer-subsidized existence for extremely dubious reasons

bingerman 7y ago
There is not too much common with having a farm and having a homestead except (in most cases) rurality. To support your homestead financially you can be a farmer but you can be a software engineer too like I am. Farming is commercial activity to produce maximum amounts of "stuff" to sell others. Our homesteading usually produces some extra veggies too, but we share them with neighbours. Nowadays a lot of the most boring and repetitive stuff can be optimised even in commercial farming. Chopping wood (and felling the trees with a chainsaw!) for the whole year, for example, takes less than a week of combined relatively relaxed and certainly not mindnumbing labor with modern tools. Personally I just often use an axe anyway since it gives a superb workout and I like it (I grew up in a farm so it has no novelty value for me). Doing a lot of various small tasks that itself are boring and mindless when done commercially is really the best lifestyle I know. Of course, your idea of perfect life is allowed to be different. There are homesteading purists who refuse to use even tractors and that stuff includes a lot more hard labour with little results. Oil has really changed the game and running a homestead doesn't have to be from zero to completely self sufficient in a year sort of thing. Especially those who haven't grown up in a farm (or homestead) need to start slowly to see if the reality of homesteading is what they really are after.
perl4ever 7y ago
"I'm always amused by office workers that idealize rural living" or welding, or plumbing, or... However, I think there's also an effect of getting older, where you feel like you need more space and are willing to have a little more responsibility for it, because you then get to maintain it the way you like. That doesn't necessarily mean farming or moving to the country, but it might mean shovelling and mowing.

bingerman 7y ago

There is not too much common with having a farm and having a homestead except (in most cases) rurality. To support your homestead financially you can be a farmer but you can be a software engineer too like I am. Farming is commercial activity to produce maximum amounts of "stuff" to sell others. Our homesteading usually produces some extra veggies too, but we share them with neighbours. Nowadays a lot of the most boring and repetitive stuff can be optimised even in commercial farming. Chopping wood (and felling the trees with a chainsaw!) for the whole year, for example, takes less than a week of combined relatively relaxed and certainly not mindnumbing labor with modern tools. Personally I just often use an axe anyway since it gives a superb workout and I like it (I grew up in a farm so it has no novelty value for me). Doing a lot of various small tasks that itself are boring and mindless when done commercially is really the best lifestyle I know. Of course, your idea of perfect life is allowed to be different. There are homesteading purists who refuse to use even tractors and that stuff includes a lot more hard labour with little results. Oil has really changed the game and running a homestead doesn't have to be from zero to completely self sufficient in a year sort of thing. Especially those who haven't grown up in a farm (or homestead) need to start slowly to see if the reality of homesteading is what they really are after.

perl4ever 7y ago

"I'm always amused by office workers that idealize rural living" or welding, or plumbing, or... However, I think there's also an effect of getting older, where you feel like you need more space and are willing to have a little more responsibility for it, because you then get to maintain it the way you like. That doesn't necessarily mean farming or moving to the country, but it might mean shovelling and mowing.