21.6 acres

That’s the size of the Pine Bush parcel that developers want to turn into sixteen or so large suburban houses in the Pine Bush as shown on the mapper that I wrote for Save the Pine Bush.

That number sticks in my mind because that’s around the acreage of land I eventually want to own for my off-grid cabin and homestead. You know enough land to buffer from neighbors so not to smell their burn barrel or hear their noise, be raise livestock and other food, be able to have big fires without bothering others, and have an ample wood supply for heating.

Like any planning board meeting, the Guilderland Planning Board went through the initial proposed site plan, and took an initial hard look, a skeptical one in preparation of most likely approving it, as Save the Pine Bush fights back. Yet, it all seems so erily similar to the books I’ve been reading about building a house, developing a homestead, transforming raw land. Because essentially that’s my vision, assuming that when I do eventually own land, there are no structures and infrastructure on it.

Yet at the same time, it seems to pull my cogonative dissodence, thinking that I’m dreaming of developing a similar parcel, transforming a piece of so-called raw land aka woods or maybe farm field into a homestead. I know it’s different to build a small off-grid cabin, compared to a million dollar plus suburban road to 15 plastic-covered McMansions and lawns, but it’s still consuming land, domesticating and controlling it with livestock and farm equipment. It’s no longer open woods once you put a house and barn on it, no matter if it’s a few hundred square feet compared to dozens of large suburban houses as disconnected from the surrounding land as can be.