Lately, I think a lot about escaping. I dream of building my own cabin, chopping my own wood and living off the land. Usually in this fantasy I am sitting in front of a roaring fire I've just built in my stone fireplace cradling a cup of steaming hot cocoa. The flames dance off the hundreds of canned fruits and vegetables which line the open shelves down the wall of my cabin. The feather bed is piled high with Grandma's quilts and dried thyme, rosemary and lavender hang from the rafters, giving the room a sweet, peaceful scent. Just when I start to really enjoy the scene I 've conjured up in my imagination, reality begins to tug.
"Where did I get Cocoa?" I ask myself.
"You trapped something and traded it for cocoa when you hike out to civilization once a year," I answer myself.
"Really? Did I have to gut and skin it? Because I'm not sure I could handle that?"
"Ok, you grew a bunch of that lavender you saw hanging around and sell it."
"Sell it how? Online? Do I have an Internet connection at the cabin because I don't remember seeing one--just the vegetables and quilts. How do I ship the lavender? Do I have to collect sales tax? Does that have to be remitted quarterly? Do I make enough to pay the property taxes on the cabin and buy health insurance? You know, it could be financially devastating if I had a major illness and had to be life flighted out of the wilderness."
"Forget it," I sadly think. "There is no such thing as a simple life in today's stressed out society."
But if not a cabin, is it possible to at least simplify my suburban existance?