So you think you're a homesteader? Lessons from the MAYFLOWER. November 10, 1620- after having buried at sea the first casualty among the colonist's, young William Button, the MAYFLOWER sights land. As I've said before, navigation in this period was something less than a fine art, so actual land fall was the best way to know where they were & where they were was Cape Cod Mass. This presented a problem because their "legal" and agreed upon land was in Virginia. At that time "Virginia" covered a lot of ground, roughly from modern South Carolina to the Hudson River in present New York ! I'll try to cover the behind the scenes Geo-politics in another post, but for now it's enough to know they're not where they're supposed to be. The colonist's insist on turning south and going below the Hudson, after pursuing this course for a half day, they encounter shoals and rough currents and the Master of the ship, Christopher Jones ( a very shady character & experienced pirate ) turns back North. With provisions running out, fuel for cooking almost spent & illness & fatigue bearing down on them, the colonist abandon the idea of Virginia and return to Cape Cod. No one among the colonist's is happy about placing themselves outside their agreed upon lands but reality forces the decision. So what's the lesson ? We all have hopes & dreams for our homestead, who doesn't want a thousand acres with a river, broad fields of rock free top soil and woodland full of game ? Reality intrudes on dreams with financial constraints, jobs & relatives that tie us to an area etc. . It's not about giving up on your dream so much as accepting reality and adjusting your dream to fit. I would love to have more acreage but I can't afford it, should I just say "the hell with it" and live in an apartment? More level ground without rocks would be great but it's just not in the cards so I've learned to use the rocks I clear and I use my tractor to grade out more flat. Don't give up- adapt !!
-Unicoi Ludd
No comments:
Post a Comment