Dropping out of the industrial capitialist economy is a tool only available to the small minority of humans who live in one. Even then it ain't easy. Unlike the vast majority of our species who live lives so close to the ground there's no where to drop to, we the entitled have the luxury of choices.Back then it seemed possible, especially as there was an early 80s recession up here in BC, that a person could live a cash life, could raise a family without being beholding to the beast, could even be an example to others that it could be done. Of course that was a pipedream, very few folks, then or now, are interested in a lifelong vow of poverty, sweat and mixed success. Some folks in some places succeeded well enough to have formed the roots of today's organic foods and local markets, our little attempt was maybe ahead of its time, maybe behind, but one thing it wasn't was the vechicle to social justice or change that i envisioned, just lottsa hard work.
What really happened was that the cycles of planting, tending and harvesting, of winter, spring, summer and fall, of rain or drought became my cycles. They snuck up on me, turned me on to the everyday miracle all around us, tuned me in to our immersion in-not seperation from-the miracle. We are all interconnected so actually dropping out is immpossible, we can though use the process of learning to live with nature and wanting less material goods as a tool for individual awakening. We can't drop out of the planet killing greed machine totally, but we can resist.
