One of the things I find myself spending a lot of time lately is trying to understand the rural landscape and people’s relationship to land and property. The architecture and barns, the livestock raised, how people piece together a living in the country.

Methods of study vary. One is the simple just traveling to rural areas, riding rural roads on my bike. Climbing mountains and peering down into the valleys. Things I’ve done for years now, but now with a much more careful eye, trying to figure out what I actually want to some day not that far in the future incorporate into my life. Styles of architecture, layout of homesteads and gardens, livestock and even toys like ATVs, tractors and trucks.

But at the same time I’ve been doing a lot of reading and listening to e-books about farming and homesteading, books about the wilderness and how people relate to the land. In many ways it’s taking off my rose colored glasses on the topic. I grew up in the country, I know about barnyards and breaking ice to water ducks and feed dogs in the winter and all the smells and hard work that go along. Still maybe I didn’t think as much about stewardship and how much farmers of all stripes struggle to stay on the land, and the hustle to stay afloat selling what they can. Often it really is a fight for life against markets, pests, disease and weather. Or how 5 acre homesteads chew away at once vibrant farming lands. YouTube videos are good to get a look at every day operations of farms and homesteads but sometimes five hundred page books give you a lot more of the back story.

People will say I’m wasting my time in analysis and study, years of my life are rapidly fading away while rent checks fly out the door padding my landlords pockets. But I want to do it right, build the right homestead in the right location, be thoughtful not rushed. The time is not now but will come and armed with facts on all aspects of rural life, I will make better decisions. I grew up in the country and went to school in a small town, yet there is much more to learn.