As The Crow Flies

My cabin in BC is water access only and I don’t own a boat. I usually stay up for between 1-2 months before the water taxi comes back to pick me up.

One of the things I discovered living up there without access to stores is I don’t need anything. If something would break, I would need to fix it with what was at hand. If I couldn’t fix it, I would lie down on my couch, have a hot beverage, look out at the view for a while, and then an idea would come to me as how I could fix it with what was at hand. If that idea didn’t work, I would repeat above steps. If it still didn’t work, I would leave it. Because it’s hard to say anything is a pressing need when you have shelter from the rain, a good view, and a hot beverage.

Some times I would begin to run out of something like coffee and worry, “Oh, no. I’m going to run out of coffee.� When the morning came that there was no coffee, I would wake up, make myself a cup of tea and never think about it. Then I would start to run low on tea and I would think, “Oh no, soon there will be no tea.� When the morning came that there wasn’t any tea, I would wake up and make myself a cup of hot water. Lying on my couch, drinking hot water, and looking out at the view I felt even happier because now I was free from the need of coffee and tea.

After six months, I talked to my sister about my experiences up there. I said it was weird; I didn’t need anything. I told here how strange it was to come back to town and see a whole society built on exchanging money. She told me it was the Sears and Roebuck catalog that finally got farmers to leave the country and go to work in factories.