The first video clip describes my personal journey in the usual, self-indulgent manner, and the program allowed no time for subsequent questions. The second clip humorously describes the efforts we’ve made at the mud hut, and the formal presentation is followed by my answers to a few softly spoken questions.

Also on 13 November 2011, during a break from the conference, I was interviewed by KMO along with Kurt Cobb and Henry Warwick. The resulting audio file is posted at KMO’s C-REALM radio.

Finally, my monthly essay for Transition Voice was published a few days ago: Is terminating the industrial economy a moral act? The latter essay is permalinked at Counter Currents.

Also, as I’ve indicated many times, there are a couple general approaches one can pursue along the path of climate change and simultaneous collapses of the industrial economy and the living planet. You can hit the road, or you can mitigate in place. Either way, you’ll need to secure clean water and healthy food, maintain body temperature, and create and maintain a decent human community.

I recommend a life of travel for most people, although I’ve taken a different route for personal reasons. Either way, an adventure-filled life awaits. On the road, you’ll need quick wits, good interpersonal skills, and astonishing amounts of creativity, compassion, and courage. Ditto for mitigating in place. In this post, I’ll address the primary concerns associated with mitigating in place, with a particular focus on me and the mud hut (my favorite subject and my favorite location, respectively).

If you’re staying put, I suggest you pay attention to the 3 Rs of the future. No, not the educational ones from years gone by. And it’s far too late for the three Rs targeting reduced consumption in a nation build on consumption, two of which we have ignored because there is no financial profit in reducing and reusing. Recycling — the only one of these three relevant actions fascist Amerika promotes — is like an apology after a punch in the face (credit Mike Sliwa). We punch the planet in the face with every cultural act, and then we apologize by sorting plastic and aluminum into separate bins.

The three Rs of interest in this post are relocalization, resilience, and redundancy. We’re headed for a severely constrained future with respect to transport of materials and humans. The days of the 12,000-mile supply chain are nearly behind us. Forget about cheap plastic crap from China, expensive watches from Switzerland, and decent hand tools from the Sears Roebuck catalog: We’re going to have to make do with what we’ve got in the very local area. Before the supply chain breaks, we should work toward building a resilient set of living arrangements steeped in redundancy. After the supply chain breaks, it’ll be a little late to start digging a well and learning how to grow food.

Here at the mud hut, we pay serious attention to multiple sources of water (two solar pumps, hand pump, rainwater harvesting from two rooftops, and the nearby river), food (wildcrafting, orchard, gardens, goats for milk and cheese, eggs from ducks and chickens, and in the future, hunting relatively large-bodied animals), body temperature (well-insulated, passive-solar house, multiple awnings, proper clothing, and abundant water and firewood), and human community (abundance in this category exceeds my patience to explain again, but search the archives for a few hints). I’ve no doubt we’re missing some things that will ease our lives in our post-carbon future. Some of these items will remain unknown, even to us, until it’s too late. I’m already missing a few things, even before the impending big crash leads to “lights out.” (As Dmitry Orlov uncharacteristically suggests, the day draws near. As “Tyler Durden” characteristically suggests, the day is near enough to be seen by a blind man.) And as I’ve mentioned a few hundred times, skyrocketing greenhouse gas emissions, along with wholesale destruction of the living planet, will seal our fate as a species unless we crash this luxury ship, and soon.

I know you’ve read this one before, but I’d love to have a solar ice-maker to cool our drinks and our bodies. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, I won’t. And I suspect we’ll muddle through, until we don’t. I’d love to have more time to convince my human community to climb aboard the collapse train. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, I won’t. And I suspect we’ll muddle through, until we don’t. I’d love to make a few more trips to discuss the dire nature of our predicaments with people who are aware and interested. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, I won’t. And I suspect I’ll muddle through, although I’ll miss trips tentatively scheduled to Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, New England, and various places nearer the mud hut.

Closer to home, and closer to my heart, I’d love to have time for my parents — and the thousands of other winter immigrants descending on this area — to make the return trip to their northern homes. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, or even within a few months, they won’t. And I have no idea how we’ll muddle through.

All things being equal, I’d rather have the solar ice-maker in a community fully on-board with collapse. All things being equal, I’d rather make a multitude of excursions to exotic places. All things being equal, I’d rather my parents experience collapse in their own home. But all things are not equal and, more than all these things, I’d rather have a planet marked by much more abundance and far fewer extinctions than we’re currently witnessing.

_________________

I’m scheduled to speak at several events during the coming week or so; (1) On Wednesday, 9 November at 7:00 p.m., I’ll address the Atlanta Beyond Oil Monthly Meetup, 657 Rosalia Street SE, Atlanta, Georgia; on (2) Saturday, 12 November and Sunday, 13 November I’ll deliver two, 18-minute presentations at the International Conference on Sustainability, Transition & Culture Change in Bellaire, Michigan, and (3) on Tuesday, 15 November at 6:30 p.m. at 5885 M 115 Frankfort Hwy, I’ll speak about developing a durable set of living arrangements in Benzonia, Michigan (sponsored by Grow Benzie). I hope to meet you at one (or more) of these events.
_________________

This post is permalinked at the Refreshment Center and Island Breath.

I’ve embedded one of the thirteen presentations I delivered over a span of eight days. It’s my final presentation, excluding Q&A (which might come later), which partially explains my on-and-off incoherence (the remainder is inexplicable, as usual).

The presentation includes a half-hearted pitch of my final book. The book is available, a couple months earlier than anticipated, and can be found at this link as well as the usual online outlets. If all goes according to plan, I’ll receive a few copies later today. The book has already been reviewed by Sandy Krolick, the kulturCritic and Cameron Conaway, the poet. Krolick’s review was picked up by Transition Voice, and Conaway’s review was run by Examiner.

I’m trying to produce video from my presentation at a Harvest Gathering Festival with a barn as venue. I may post it at a later date, if all goes according to plan. It includes no slides, and the material differs considerably from the one above.

Reaction was mixed, as usual. Some people, such as this college student, found my messages unbelievable. Others quibbled with the timing of the sources I presented (I carefully avoided pushing my own predictions). Standing ovations were rare — even though I begged for them — but in the end several people understood the importance of collapse if we are to extend our run as a species.

____________________

Huge thanks to Shelley Youngman, who facilitated, organized, chauffeured, and hosted. A kindred spirit, Shelley was kind enough to make many of the arrangements and also to spend large blocks of time with me. Voluntarily, no less.

Thanks, too, to my many new friends and hosts (in the order I met them): Mike Draney and Vicki Medland (University of Wisconsin-Green Bay), Steve DeGoosh and Brooke Isham (Northern Michigan University), Sarah Redmond and Dan Redmond (Alger Community Transition), Shelley Youngman and Frank Youngman (Transition Cadillac), and Kimberly Sager and Aaron Wissner (Local Future).

____________________

This post is permalinked at Plan B Economics and Survival Acres.

Acknowledgments: Karen Sliwa performed real work on the property while Mike Sliwa shot and edited these videos. You can follow the work of Mike and Karen here.

As a result of runaway fossil-fuel consumption, the amount of carbon released to the atmosphere is still going up, even as the industrial economy is buried in a depression. We haven’t observed below-average temperatures on this planet for 25 years. Even high oil prices can’t keep a bad country down.

The response of the government and its sponsors at the Federal Reserve Bank remains unchanged: print money. Quantitative Easing (QE, i.e., printing money) has been a complete failure. But because Ben Bernanke has adopted levitating the stock markets as the Federal Reserve Bank’s prime directive, I’ve no doubt we’ll see QE 3, QE 4, and so on, right through to QE infinity until the U.S. dollar joins every other fiat currency in the dustbin of history. Alan Greenspan warned about the worthless paper certain to result from the ongoing Ponzi scheme, back in 2005.

The debt problem is as bad as they say. And probably worse than anybody is saying. Reducing U.S. debt causes the stock markets to fall profoundly. Increasing U.S. debt makes a dire predicament worse, but a missed payment on U.S. debt leads directly to junk status for the dollar, so Benny and the Inkjets will continue to print until the dollar is dead.

What are the options, after all? We’re on a train going over a cliff, and the cabin smells of natural gas. We can ride out the train wreck or jump out, sans parachutes. The banksters in charge have posed a third option: light a match. As economist Mish says, “Expect chaos.”

Every additional brick in the wall of civilization, placed there by the fascists in charge, has two profound consequences. First, each brick enriches the financially wealthy at the expense of the rest of us, even as economic collapse looms. Second, every brick further destroys the remnants of the living planet. Let’s kick Barack Obama — the American Gorbachev — out of the way so we can tear down this wall.

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This essay is permalinked at Kick It Over and Plan B Economics.

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Update: Please note the new CLASSIFIED ad under the tab, above

Infallible

A
sliver
of green
and fertile
earth, far from
other lands. Poly-
nesians settled long
ago, and came to under-
stand. Three days of labor,
tilling the soil, could feed them-
selves all year. Easter Island was
paradise. They found a good life here.

Time was abundant, since food was so easy,
to grow in the rich fertile soil. Idle minds couldn’t
be controlled, thought the leaders, royal. Something was
needed to occupy and otherwise engage, by sweat. Good
stone was there, to offer the gods; all their requirements met.

Statues were carved, fierce images in stone, most weighing dozens of
tons. Trees by the thousands were cut for roads; down to the coast they run.
Infallible gods watch as the clans compete: Who will the winner be? Thousands
more fell, for levers and rolls, to move those blocks down to the sea.

The work went on, for years and years, till finally there was only one tree. Soil
depleted by overuse; no trees meant the rain could run free. Obsession
continued, all was neglected, faster and faster they hauled. Food became
scarce, their hunger burned as they watched the last tree fall.

Oh, my god! What have we done? How come we never
knew? I must be asleep. This must be a dream.
There’s no way that this can be true. We
trusted those people, and thought
they knew best. And no
one disputed their
view. My family!
My kids! I can’t
let them die!
But what
am I going
to do?

Unsinkable

She
was the
most luxurious
ship that ever sailed,
a testament to man’s imagination.
Water-tight compartments, she could
not sink; appointments that met high expectations.
Fifty two thousand tons, built by the best of Belfast.
Her master, Captain, E. J. Smith, had experience deep and vast.

Sailed from Southampton, on April Tenth, Nineteen Twelve, AD. More
passengers boarded, at Cherbourg and Queenstown; then Titanic steamed out to sea.
On the eve of the fifteenth, she was making good time, on a moonless night, calm and cold. She’d arrive in New York, much sooner than thought, for the White Star Lines worth more than gold.

Just past eleven, the lookouts were perched, high above the deck. Iceberg warnings had come and gone; her speed hadn’t been held in check. Binoculars forgotten, just one of those things, as they tried hard to see in starlight. At eleven-forty, a dark mass ahead; they’d failed in
their duty that night.

The watch-crew tried to turn the ship, but her rudder was built much too
small. With twenty life boats stored on deck, too few by half for
all. Ice opened her keel, the North Atlantic poured in; Captain
Smith awakened from dreaming. Turned out, the pumps
could have held thru that night, if Ismay hadn’t ordered,
Resume Steaming!

Oh, my god! What have we done? How come we never
knew? I must be asleep. This must be a dream.
There’s no way that this can be true. We
trusted those people, and thought
they knew best. And no
one disputed their
view. My family!
My kids! I can’t
let them die!
But what
am I going
to do?

Inconceivable

A
way of
life inconceivable
to those from not long ago.
That it was all taken for granted,
made it seem doubly so. For thousands
of years, muscle and sweat was the currency
of power. Then something magical came along,
and all the old ways were scoured.

Those in the late industrial age, those of at least modest means,
could travel at thirty-thousand feet, and eat food from three thousand miles.
Clean fresh water on tap at every temp. from icy cold to hot; central heating and
air, and so much more, common in most domiciles. Travel was fast and comfortable,
but still thought of as a chore. The Green Revolution increased food supply by a
hundred-fold or more. Advances up and down the line in every part of their lives, added to their life spans as their living standards soared.

Few realized all this came from something buried deep below. Fossil fuels were ancient plants; Sun’s energy made them grow. Extracted and consumed by fire, this energy released; creating never-ending power, at least that’s how it seemed. Seventy-six cubic miles of oil, just about the total; when half was gone by two thousand five, loomed the ending to their dream.

Fossil fuels had enabled them to draw-down and deplete, the resources they relied upon for
all their basic needs. Using these resources, more quickly than they formed, meant each
day two hundred and five thousand more mouths to feed. Financial systems crumbled as energy supplies fell short. The climate grew much more severe, reducing earth’s
support. This gigantic house of cards was built because of closed eyes. The
ending when it finally came caught most of them by surprise.

Oh, my god! What have we done? How come we never
knew? I must be asleep. This must be a dream.
There’s no way that this can be true. We
trusted those people, and thought
they knew best. And no
one disputed their
view. My family!
My kids! I can’t
let them die!
But what
am I going
to do?

______________________

John Stassek used to help run his family’s small farm and feed businesses, until they failed in 2009. He is now semi-retired, driving a school bus part-time. He enjoys interacting with the kids and finds it’s much less stressful than farming. He is a member of the Lions Club and is also a member of Transition Van Buren-Allegan, trying to help create transition towns in southwestern Michigan. He keeps busy by working on his home to make it more energy efficient, gardening, and now, writing poetry. His librarian wife brought him a copy of Poetry for Dummies, two pages of which he read before composing this work. His long term plans are to finish reading the book. They have two happy and well adjusted children, and a fabulous new daughter-in-law, living on the West Coast in Seattle and Portland. He lives with his loving and patient wife, Debby, and their spoiled German Shepherd, Annie.

On to that card: It was filled with proud stories of the kids in the U.S. Army, and it closed with, “We pray for peace.” I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Never mind that the writer almost certainly is fooling herself. If her prayers are answered, that’ll put the battle-ready kids out of their jobs. And, since war comprises the foundation for our entire industrial economy, the empire almost surely would sink to the bottom of the already stinking swamp within weeks of an outbreak of peace. Praying for peace makes as much sense as supporting the troops, and both cases of wishful thinking are clothed in lies.

I can only imagine how many people I’ll offend with this essay. And yet, I can’t seem to stop myself. Any decent social critic points out the lunacy of societal taboos. I’m not suggesting I’m a decent social critic. But I can no longer ignore this most annoying of taboos.

Support the troops. It’s the rallying cry of an entire nation. It’s the slogan pasted on half the bumpers in the country.

Supporting the troops is pledging your support for the empire. Supporting the troops supports the occupation of sovereign nations because might makes right. Supporting the troops supports wanton murder of women and children throughout the world. And men, too. Supporting the troops supports obedience at home and oppression abroad. Supporting the troops throws away every ideal on which this country allegedly is founded. Supporting the troops supports the ongoing destruction of the living planet in the name of economic growth. Supporting the troops therefore hastens our extinction in exchange for a few dollars. Supporting the troops means caving in to Woodrow Wilson’s neo-liberal agenda, albeit cloaked as contemporary neo-conservatism (cf. hope and change). Supporting the troops trumpets power as freedom and fascism as democracy.

Image: en.wikipedia.org

Perhaps most importantly, supporting the troops means giving up on resistance. Resistance is all we have, and all we’ve ever had. We say we’re mad as hell and we claim we’re not going to take it any more. But, sadly, we gave up on resistance of any kind years ago. After all, we might get in trouble. We might be incarcerated for protesting without a permit.

When jets from the nearby military base scream over the university campus, conversation stops, indoors or out. We pause awkwardly, stopped in mid-conversation. After the jets pass, in formation, an excuse often is articulated by the person with whom I’m visiting: “It’s the sound of freedom.”

My response never varies: “Sounds like oppression to me.”

The ensuing silence is more awkward than the scream of the jet engines.

It’s as if America’s cultural revolution never happened. It’s as if we never questioned the dominant paradigm in an empire run amok, as if we never experienced Woodstock and the Summer of Love, bra-burning hippies and war-torn teenagers, Rosa Parks and the Cuyahoga River. We’re right back in the 1950s, swimming in culture’s main stream instead of questioning, resisting, and protesting.

In a Tucson coffee shop last week I saw a woman, apparently in her early twenties, dressed in a short skirt, an apron, and high heels. Had she been behind the counter, she would have been the perfect symbol of the 1950s, a refugee from two generations gone by. We’ve moved from the unquestioning automatons of Aldous Huxley and George Orwell to the firebrands of a radical counter-cultural worldview and back again. A generational sea change swept us from post-war “liberators” drunk on early 1950s propaganda to revolutionaries willing to take risks in defense of late 1960s ideals. The revolution gained steam through the 1970s, but lost its way when the U.S. industrial economy hit the speed bump of domestic peak oil. The Carter Doctrine — the world’s oil belongs to us — coupled with Ronald Reagan’s soothing pack of lies, was the perfect match to our middle-aged comfort, so we abandoned the noble ideals of earlier days for another dose of palliative propaganda. Three decades later, we’ve swallowed so much Soma we wouldn’t couldn’t find a hint of revolution in Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto.

In short, the pillars of social justice and environmental protection rose from the cesspool of ignorance to become shining lights for an entire generation. And then we let them fall back into the swamp. The very notion that others matter — much less that those others are worth fighting for — has been relegated to the dustbin of history.

The problem with being a martyr: You have to die for the cause. And along the way, you’ll probably be jailed and tortured. But there’s a fate far worse than being a martyr, in the minds of America’s youth. There’s the thought you’ll be viewed as an anti-American freak, out of touch with Lady Gaga and Dancing With The Stars. A fate worse than death: Your Facebook page will be removed, thus “disappearing” you.

A line from Eugene Debs, five-time candidate of the Socialist party for U.S. president, comes to mind: “While there is a lower class I am in it, while there is a criminal element I am of it; while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.” He was serious. So am I. That I am not taken seriously in these most serious of days pulverizes my ego. That Debs is not taken seriously these days shatters my heart.

When I visit with college-age people these days, they have no idea what I mean, and they believe Debs and I are misguided jokers. Completely immersed in a culture of make believe, mind-fucked from birth by the corporations running the media, the thought of resistance is, quite simply, beyond the pale. Resistance? Against what? And why? Isn’t resistance a form of terrorism?

Every revolution has failed. And if that’s not sufficient reason to launch a revolution, I don’t know what is. The revolution is dead: Viva la revolution!

If any one of those troops we claim to support attempts to bring transparency and reform to this country, we instantly turn on him and support his torture by — you guessed it — the troops. And who’s the commander in chief of these troops? That’s right, the man who promised transparency and reform, but who now seeks to crush the very people trying to bring it to us.

If obliterating transparency means criminalizing journalism, we can live with that. Those journalists are probably terrorists anyway. Or worse, liberals. The First Amendment was shredded by Obama’s predecessor, and how it’s being turned to ash. The U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights are bobbing along the same waves as social justice and environmental protection, sold down the river by a nation addicted to growth for the sake of growth (the ideology of a cancer cell).

It seems very little matters to the typical American beyond economic growth. And for that, most importantly, we need an uninterrupted supply of crude oil. All wars are resource wars, and even our involvement in the last “Good War” was about oil, notwithstanding revisionist history about our compassion regarding Hitler’s final solution. Crude oil’s near-term annual decline rate of 10% means many troops will be needed to secure the lifeblood of the industrial economy. After all, world demand hasn’t peaked yet, although world supply has. If we’re to continue running ruining the world, we’ll need plenty of troops. And they’ll need your support.

You keep supporting the troops, and trying to convince yourself you’re fighting terrorism in the process. If doubt creeps in, turn on the television. Listen to the news anchors and the politicians, the characters and the commercials. Immerse yourself in the ultimate hallucination. Keep lapping up the self-censored “news,” confident the future will bring even more self-indulgent hedonism than the recent past.

And if somebody tries to tell you the hegemony of the U.S. dollar is threatened, thereby causing the price of oil to skyrocket, you just ignore the uncomfortable news, just as the mainstream media have ignored it. That kind of thing can’t happen here. It’s never happened, so it can’t happen (Francis Bacon’s Idol of the Den). If some misinformed fool attempts to point out the consequences of consumerism, shrug him off as a terrorist. And if somebody tries to confuse your happy holidays by telling you the good news about economic collapse, you tell him you’ll be praying for peace. That’ll make it all okay.

How timely, then, when the hostess walked by, sans pants. And, better yet, she dropped her pen right in front of us. As she bent down to pick up the pen, she literally covered her ass with her left hand while picking up the pen with her right hand.

At least modesty isn’t completely dead. But I have to admit that, even with her relatively small butt, her hand didn’t quite do the trick.

I’m not saying I don’t appreciate the born-again fashion scene, last popular a decade or so ago. In fact, the CYA hostess reminds me to mention, as if I haven’t done so enough already, that it’s time to start covering our own asses.

On the front of economic meltdown, the Pentagon is ratcheting up its plans to deal with civil unrest. In itself, this is not news. What’s new is that the Pentagon is not hiding it. The news broke on CNBC, which is hardly a fringe player in the realm of the blogosphere.

The government is not your friend. They are not here to protect you and yours. In fact, a quick look at the latest climate-change projections, along with the associated inaction, suggests the government is working pretty hard to kill us all.

Decent human communities offer a solution for each of us, albeit partial ones. These communities are necessary, but likely not sufficient, to fend off the ongoing evils of imperialism. It’s time to deepen the bonds within our tribes. It’s time to fend for ourselves, and prepare to fend off the government.

The prescient words of Edward Abbey come to mind: “A patriot must be ready to defend his country against his government.”

When our son Ben was born in 1999, my wife Stacy and I decided that one child was enough. For starters, there was her obvious discomfort during the pregnancy. Financially, we knew that we could not afford to put multiple children through college. Our chosen careers brought in a comfortable income as long as we kept our ‘needs’ and ‘wants’ clearly in balance. In addition, my wife wanted to stay home with the baby for at least a year and then return to professional employment. All of this required us to quickly re-think our careers, retirement plans, and even where we lived. As any decent parent will tell you, children have a way of doing this.

At a conference in 2008, I attended a panel discussion on the future of ‘sustainability.’ A researcher from the emerging science of bio-mimicry explained how rising levels of carbon dioxide emissions would destroy much of the world’s ecosystems. With obvious difficulty, she managed to suppress her emotions long enough to describe the future she thought awaited her children. In order to prepare them for the challenges ahead, she was teaching them to be ‘resilient.’

Following the conference, I began my own research into the effects of climate change. It was then that I came across the complex economic theory of ‘peak oil’ as explained by Richard Heinberg, Colin Campbell, and many others. Quite suddenly it was clear to me that the ‘endless growth’ model of western civilization was coming to an end and that this process would only be exacerbated by the effects of climate change. This time, it wasn’t just my own future that needed re-thinking, it was my son’s as well.

How could I prepare us for an uncertain future without scaring my family? Moving to Canada or joining a ‘life boat’ community was not an option unless I wanted a swift divorce. We did not have the money to go ‘off the grid’ even if it made sense in an urban neighborhood. My wife was supportive but unwilling to confront the issue head on; she left that duty to me. As I thought through the ramifications of the ‘long emergency’ I desperately needed to channel that energy into something productive.

At the time, my wife had a co-worker who brought fresh eggs into the office: We were hooked. With my wife and son’s enthusiastic support, I set about designing a chicken coop for ourselves. My goal was to make this a neighbor-friendly project and use it as a teaching opportunity. The small city where we live permitted chickens, but had an unwritten policy banning roosters.

The first step was to teach my son the fine art of dumpster diving for construction materials. We kept our eyes on local construction bins, obtained the necessary permissions, put on our gloves and went safely to work. We salvaged scraps of construction lumber, half sheets of exterior grade plywood, and even a few concrete blocks. During construction, I let my son and the neighbor’s kids pour concrete, nail framing, and put on a coat of paint. When it was ready, my wife drove down to the Farmer’s Co-op and brought home four hens in dog kennels.

We’ve had the girls (Hermione, Ginny, Luna, and Molly) for 18 months. The three of us take turns distributing free eggs to neighbors who greatly appreciate them. In return we receive empty egg cartons and kitchen scraps for the chickens. Occasionally we are rewarded with homemade cookies or a jar of local preserves as barter. A neighbor down the street was so impressed with our effort, he built his own coop. Without a doubt, this experiment has been a huge success with one exception; our care for the chickens exceeds the current cost of eggs at the grocery store. As far as I am concerned, the benefits far outweigh the difference.

This initial effort at food production encouraged me to expand the little garden I have had for many years. Last spring, my son and I planted a wide variety of seeds including lettuce, collards, beans, tomatoes, and much more. The idea, I explained to him, was to see what we could grow in our shady yard that would feed us as well as the chickens. He helped with planting the seeds, transferring the young seedlings, watering during the summer heat and harvesting. It was his idea to protect the plants from local deer by cutting and bending a section of metal rabbit fencing over the rows. We took turns with the single pair of wire cutters and discussed ways to cover them with plastic when winter set in.

Although the summer drought reduced our yield, we had good success with the lettuce and collards. We all enjoy eating the fresh lettuce; our second crop is still producing. The collards are strictly for the chickens! As summer blended into fall, Ben helped me plant onion and garlic bulbs, which have come up beautifully. Again, this ongoing project serves two purposes. It’s about learning what I can grow in our yard as well as teaching Ben where his food comes from.

My next project was to teach him how to preserve food. I purchased a large canning pot and the required accessories before we headed off last May to pick strawberries. In August, he and I went to pick peaches at the local orchard where we pick apples in the fall. For those of you who have never tried this, canning preserves is hot, sticky work with potential health effects so I limited his initial involvement in the actual processing. This has not diminished his appreciation of his own efforts, which he is reminded of every time he pops the lid on a fresh jar of jam. To add to this new family tradition, we plan on opening the peaches with the first winter snow, or Christmas morning, whichever comes first.

Our next project together was to excavate a basic root cellar by hand. Although I did most of the hard digging with a pick, my son managed to extract a few buckets of Virginia red clay on his own. As the pit got deeper, I handed buckets up to him, he dumped them in the wheelbarrow and sent the empty buckets back down to me. At some point, the ‘fun’ of hauling dirt wore off and buckets started costing me 25 cents apiece. Needless to say, the economic lesson of working and saving money is an ongoing one at our house. Although it cost me a few dollars, it was important to me to teach Ben about the earth’s constant temperature below the frost line.

When Ben was just a year old, Stacy and I started reading to him each night at bedtime. Even though he is eleven now and an avid reader himself, he still enjoys this time together at the end of the day. Some of our favorite books written specifically for young readers happen to have post-apocalyptic settings. The main characters are always children struggling to make sense of their world with little parental guidance. These stories are filled with personal suffering, loss, and efforts at survival. I have used this opportunity to make correlations with our efforts here at home, such as bartering and gathering food. Although I never suggest to him that his future will bear any resemblance, I hope these themes find their way through the daily bombardment of advertising promising a lifestyle that will not come to pass.

These are a few examples of my efforts thus far to prepare us for an uncertain future. I’ve also made a habit of taking Ben to the local used bookstores whenever we need to add to our growing library of appropriate technologies. We frequently watch the ‘survival’ programs on television together and discuss the commonalities. He probably knows more about our debt-based fiat currency system than the average adult. Occasionally he asks for an update on the spot price of silver. However, not all of my ideas have been well received. When I first contemplated ways to prepare my son, I thought of lessons from my own childhood in the late 1970s and 80s.

Camping from Lake Kissimmee in Florida to Moosehead Lake in Maine is how I learned to be resilient. As kids we endured hours crammed in the back of an un-air-conditioned Toyota Corolla with nothing but books to read. For meals we stopped and ate food out of the cooler in the trunk. Our first night in a tent, we learned to trim the excess drop cloth so that it doesn’t collect rainwater. Waiting for the Coleman stove to boil water, dealing with sand, bugs, and things we left on the counter at home were all part of our training. Although I had taken Ben camping as a toddler, he and my wife were less than enthusiastic about this idea. I did however, have their full support to go on my own.

It is important to remember that this is an ongoing process. I will continue to monitor what I believe is the unwinding of western civilization and take what balanced measures are appropriate for my family. What works for us may not work for others. I know that I cannot adequately prepare my son for the magnitude of the changes I expect to occur. My hope is that these experiences will allow him to adapt more readily. In all honesty, it is difficult for me to remain positive all the time but I try not to let it affect Ben’s vision of his own future. We obviously want him to work hard at school and pursue his own interests. He has our full support. In a way, I find comfort in knowing that preparing our children for an uncertain future is a dilemma that all parents face.

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Jeff Sties lives with his wife Stacy and their son Benjamin in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is an architect and the principal of Sunbiosis PLC which specializes in energy efficient single family homes. Jeff and Stacy met while attending Virginia Tech where he graduated in 1991 with a Bachelor of Architecture degree.

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This essay is permalinked at Energy Bulletin.

When I discuss mitigation for ecological and economic collapse, I stress the crucial role of human community. And I’m not the only one: A few students with whom I am working this semester are focusing on how to communicate in community, with full awareness where we are and where we’re headed. They have developed a blog, and I encourage your participation as we struggle to find our way in a world turned inside out.

Louisville, Kentucky public library Tuesday, 28 September 2010

Audio file (special thanks to Nate Pederson for recording and archiving the presentation — may he attract the attention of the government as a result)

Powerpoint (pdf)

International Bioenergy Days 2010 presentation Monday, 27 September 2010

Powerpoint (pdf)