My partner and I love to go to our friend's summer home in Springwater. We are always willing house sitters when they are out of town and need someone to stay with their cat that also summers there. The house is basically one room with a sleeping loft. There is no telephone, no microwave, no computer, and best of all, no television set. There IS electricity and running water, but that is as luxurious as it gets. There is a pond to swim in and a deck to lie on and look at the stars. The best entertainment we've had there was an opportunity to watch a magnificent midnight thunderstorm through the sliding glass doors. Another treat is to sit on the deck after dark and look at the fireflies. During the month of June, the meadow behind the house comes alive with thousands and thousands of fireflies in a light show better than any professional laser show you'll ever see.
As much as we love what the place has to offer, I think we like even better what this retreat does NOT offer. We enjoy the absence of stimulation and complication. We essentially do nothing while we are there. I never seem able to just sit, at home. Even if I am relaxing, I am reading, listening to music, or watching television. At the Springwater house, I can sit on the deck for hours at a time and just survey the landscape. The entire day's activity may be a swim in the pond (without a swim suit), a walk through the woods, a few simple meals and hours spent just being, or "visiting," as my grandparents called it, with each other. I even notice less of a craving for stimulating foods while I am there. I can eat plain popcorn, forego chocolate, and drink tea without sugar. I find it difficult to do these things in the more stimulating environment of my city home
The house is situated on land which is owned collectively by a group of homesteaders. There are several families who live on the property year 'round. Stephanie and William and their three kids live 'way back in the woods with no electricity, or running water in a little cabin they built themselves. WE enjoy paying them a visit when we are there. They grow much of their own food and amuse themselves by doing crafts, playing musical instruments and reading aloud to each other by the light of kerosene lamps. Their lifestyle is simple enough that William earns all of the money they need working part-time at a fairly low-paying job that he loves. Stephanie often goes weeks at a time without leaving home. It never seems that they are too busy for a visit. No phone calls interrupt our conversation. No one is rushing out the door to a meeting. The kids don't have soccer practice or dance classes to go to. Except for school and William's job, they rarely go any place. We also like that no one ever says "excuse the mess" even though there is always some kind of mess in evidence. Stephanie and William seem oblivious to the fact that others might notice unmade beds and dusty windowpanes. They seem to assume that visitors are there to see THEM, not to inspect their home.
The people in Springwater are living a simpler life than most of us do. They live without many of the so-called conveniences that most modern North Americans assume are basic necessities. They dwell intimately with nature and are keenly in tune with such natural cycles as the seasons and the phases of the moon. While most of us are startled to look up and find that autumn is here and the leaves have turned, Stephanie tracks the progression toward winter by observing how much time the squirrels spend gathering food, and how much fur the wild rabbits have on their paws. She takes note of the exodus of butterflies and birds that head south. When the first leaves start to yellow, she has been expecting it. Stephanie even knows which trees turn color first. All of this information dictates the work she needs to do harvesting the last late crops from her garden and "snuggling" her house for the winter. The seasons never catch her by surprise.
Each time we visit there, I am inspired by the apparent simplicity of life there. I vow to make changes in my own life. I always come away inspired by the example of William and Stephanie to give away my television set, sell my car, compost all of my vegetable scraps, and use only biodegradable soap. But somehow, as soon as I am back in the city, it seems as if there is no way that I can really attain these goals and the enormity of the changes that I would have to make in order to live like the people in Springwater. And thus I continue mostly to dream about how I would like to live and how it should be. I may read Mother Earth News and buy organic vegetables at the co-op but that is as far as it appears I can go. It seems as though a simple and ecologically responsible life is not possible in the city. But recently, I have begun to think that perhaps I have been focusing on the wrong things. Does simplicity automatically mean rural isolation?
It isn't hard to see how one could get the idea that it does. It seems that most people seeking this kind of life have fled the cities.
Many people like William and Stephanie left the city and began homesteading as part of the counter culture movement of the late 1960's and early 1970's. Disenchanted with the rampant consumerism of the 50s and 60s, such people sought a simpler lifestyle that encouraged ecological responsibility, fostered communion with nature, and allowed a greater degree of personal freedom and expression than corporate America did. Most of these so-called "hippies" had grown up in middle class homes and had been given every opportunity to follow in their parents' footsteps. But the lives they chose more closely resembled that of their nineteenth-century ancestors who homesteaded on the frontier more than they did their parents' suburban, three-bedroom split-level existence. Were the "hippies" blazing a new trail?
Far from it. Simplicity movements of one kind or another have been around for hundreds of years. Some, like Thoreau's experience at Walden Pond were individual movements that influenced others by example. Others, like the Shakers, were collective efforts inviting others to directly participate. Motivations also vary. Some favor simplicity for humanitarian and ecological reasons. Others simplify for personal well-being and stress relief. Still others view simplicity as essential for true religious expression. However, while different groups choose to emphasize one of these aspects over the others, one usually finds elements of all of them in individual models of simple living.
Perhaps the best examples of this are Helen and Scott Nearing. These now famous homesteaders wrote the best-selling book, Living the Good Life: How to Live Simply and Sanely in a Troubled World. This book has served (as one reviewer put it) as an "underground Bible for the city weary." The Nearings fled New York City in 1932 for rural Vermont where they purchased a dilapidated farm. They built their own house out of stone, and raised most of their own food. Most intriguing about their version of homesteading was its near total avoidance of money and cash purchases. They tried to barter for items that they could not make themselves and when they had earned as much cash as they needed to cover the year's expenses, they stopped earning it.
For them, an important feature of this simple existence was that it allowed them a lot of free time to pursue avocational interests such as music, writing, and community activism. This was the primary reason they chose to homestead. But they also believed that as the bumper sticker says, "By living simply, others might simply live." The Nearings were deeply concerned with the ecology of the planet and with the responsibility they had to the world's impoverished people not to squander resources. Finally, they also grew increasingly aware of the spiritual benefits of their simple lifestyle as the years passed. Their conviction that the simple life is a healthy life seems to be supported by their extreme longevity. Scott lived to be 100, finally choosing to fast to death when his body began to fail. Helen was still in vigorous good health when a car accident claimed her life when she was 91. Their lives embody all of the values of simplicity.
These were the examples which first inspired me to strive for simplicity in living. These were the images I had of the simple, ecologically responsible life. And while I wanted to emulate these lives, I felt hampered by the realities of the city.
All of these movements have as a key component, rural isolation. It seems that we always see this ideal of the simple life in bucolic, rural contexts like Springwater, Walden Pond, or the Nearing's Forest Farm, and we live in metro Rochester. No one homesteads in the South Wedge and for many of us, the closest we get to a vegetable garden is the produce department at Wegman's. Living without electricity, growing our own food, and never leaving home are not viable options in a crowded, urban center or in the suburbs. But is simplicity in living synonymous with kerosene lanterns, compost piles and solitude?
I began to realize that my efforts to live a simple life existed in a near vacuum. There seem to be few (if any) models of urban simplicity to inspire us. It is as if by its very nature, urban living could not be ecologically responsible or personally and spiritually simple. In fact, the city is always presented to us as the antithesis of an ecologically sound, spiritually healthy environment. Yet does this necessarily have to be the case? Can a simple and ecologically responsible life be lived at South Avenue and Goodman or does one have to move to Springwater with nothing but her guitar and some gardening equipment in order to achieve the good life.
In his book, Ecology: A Pocket Guide, Ernest Callenbach offers some thoughts on the sustainability of urban lifestyles. He points out that in North America, we have a prejudice against cities because we still have a frontier mentality. He contrasts this New World attitude with that of Europe where cities are more beautiful, pleasant and less ecologically damaging. He also has encouraging news for those of us who are concerned with the environment and live in cities: "On a per person basis, cities actually cause less ecological destruction than country or dispersed suburban living. Stacked apartments waste less heating energy through their walls and ceilings than separate houses do; they require less piping and electric wire. City dwellers walk more, use public transportation more, and have fewer cars. City services like mail and grocery distribution have shorter routes which use less fuel. Thus the ecological footprint of a city dweller is smaller than a country dweller or a suburbanite."
With the world's population at five billion, it isn't even possible for everyone to live like William and Stephanie or the Nearings. There isn't enough land. And in many ways, leaving the city and its problems behind is escapist and elitist. It seems more in keeping with our Unitarian Universalist faith to stay in the cities and work for transformation within.
And cities do much to benefit society, because they bring diverse people together in close proximity, new ideas are born, art flourishes, and political life tends to be freer.
So what would simplicity look like in the city? In most ways it would be similar to William and Stephanie's life in Springwater. It would include ecologically responsible practices like recycling, using public transportation, and buying only what we need. But in a more fundamental way, it would be about personal transformation. It would be about attempting to eliminate distractions and focusing on what's really important to us.
A definition of simple living will be different for everyone. For a few, it means living in the woods on an annual income of $10,000. For some it means getting rid of the television set for the sake of peace and quiet. Have you ever noticed the way it shouts at you? And its main purpose is to get us to BUY BUY BUY. Also, we rarely see characters whose lives are edifying to us. I mean Seinfeld is funny, but do we really admire Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer? Would any of them be asked to fill our pulpits?
Another person may choose to give up a high-paying, but unfulfilling job in order to pursue something she really loves and believes in. She will of course also have to accept that she'll need to scale down her lifestyle.
Someone else may eliminate all processed foods from his diet. Or he may choose vegetarianism because meat consumption inefficiently uses the world's resources and many believe that it promotes cruelty toward animals.
I personally try not to purchase anything that I have not carefully thought about. Will I really enjoy this? Will I really use this? Do I really need this? I must admit it's a constant struggle, especially in bookstores and in the ice cream aisle at the supermarket.
This concept of simplicity can be applied to our congregations as well. In his book, Transforming Liberal Congregations, Roy Phillips, though he does not actually use the word simplicity, nonetheless advocates a simpler, more straightforward way for us to be in community with each other. In his view, our congregational life is so dominated by committee and busy work that we often fail to authentically relate to and nurture one another. Phillips opens the book with this anecdote:
The cartoon titled, "New member's worst nightmare" shows an elderly man with a long, flowing beard speaking to a new young couple who has just joined the church. The couple looks at a huge bulletin board listing all of the congregation's committees. At the top is emblazoned: "Our Committees Need You."
The old man says, "Most people are on nine or ten committees, but since you're new I'm sure people will understand if you only join six or seven to start." The best part of the cartoon is the list of the committees themselves: Finance Committee, Investment Committee, Board of Trustees, yes! But it goes on...Thermostat Control Committee, Committee for More Comfortable Pews, Committee for the Promotion of Committees, Plan Watering Committee, Pigeon Control Committee.
Phillips concludes that this scenario is close to what really goes on in many of our churches. "People come to our congregations looking for bread," he writes. "Instead, we give them the stones of busy-ness."
I do not mean to suggest that much of the committee work we engage in is not important. But when it becomes the primary feature of our church life, when it serves as a "buffer" between members, when it is a substitute for caring community, then we know that our congregational life is unnecessarily cluttered and complicated.
In many churches, I have often heard the comment from others that going to church is just like going to work. They must file reports, attend meetings, and return phone calls. On Sunday mornings they are too busy running around the coffee hour with their day-timers to spend any time with anyone. It is doubtful that this is the way anyone wants church to be. No one would have designed it this way. But we modern North Americans are so enmeshed in complication and abundance that we inadvertently create it wherever we go. If church can serve any useful function in our lives it can be the one place we go that is simple, uncomplicated - a place where we focus on what is important to each others a place where we relate to one another authentically - a place where we can just be.
For those of you who think that what I am suggesting would make you feel extremely deprived, I have these words from Mahatma Ghandi: "As long as you derive inner help and comfort from a thing, you should keep it. If you were to give it up in a mood of self-sacrifice or out of a stern sense of duty, you would continue to want it back, and that unsatisfied want would make trouble for you. Only give up a thing when you want some other condition so much that this thing no longer has any attraction for you."
Simplifying does not mean living an austere life of self-denial. It is instead actually a joyous thing. It is about recognizing who you really ARE and what you really care about, and discarding the rest.
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