Tiny Homes

Yahweh tried to remind his creation that, as he does not need much space to live, why should they. 
Perhaps downsizing is the way to go.  I like the idea of building a tiny home, and have just built one.

I guess the idea is that God is reminding us always that we want too much. 
A big home is costly to heat and costly to look after. We have just been visiting all the castles of Europe and noting the stupidity of spending your life paying to fix the roof of your inheritance. 

100 tonnes of wood are needed to keep this place in Cororooke warm and even though Yahweh said to burn to cook and sacrifice there is no burden to keep air warm in the hope some cool cat will come along and appreciate it. We have just visited hundreds of castles in Europe that are no longer homes, even if they ever were such. We must be more practical if we want our houses to be homes. 

God, of course, has the right idea, If you want a house to be a home you have to first make sure you are close to people and they you. You often don't get that if you put up too many walls. 

An acacia box would be too small for us, but for someone as big as God, the symbolism of having him in the same room all the time is deeply profound and humbling. And like some cool cat , he's not making a lot of noise and demanding obedience. He gave us cats to remind us of the great value of the still small voice in our lives and how to get good outcomes by listening and waiting.

The world is your oyster when you don't tie yourself down but we poor earthbound crawling things are no longer in the Garden. We have to work to find food, so finding a good balance between sitting down and bending down is a hard one. Sabbath provides us with the practical opportunity to do both. 

If you are a farmer there is no way you can downsize easily. My friends in the ag advisory agricultural industry will say don't spend your life fixing old machinery (something we 6 kids on the farm used to do because we had no breadwinner and that was all we had ) but that means higher cash flows and a commitment to running with the high speed industry.

  

Life though in its fulness is not about profits but rewards.  And not quick profits but patiently fought for rewards ; gifts that keep on giving, . There are so many economic externalities in there because,  as my family found out,  if the crop only comes once in every 5 years, there is a lot of time in there to play with rusty metal.

No boy should be denied the chance to have his own Scrap Heap Challenge. 

Which brings me to the tiny house we built for a friend on his own farm . A house which now provides the bottom line in any home ; somewhere to sit, sleep and move around . Our friend cannot move around much , so we have provided roof rails to enables some movement around the bed in which he spends most of his time. 

But the lesson is clear , a small house can make a lot of sense. 
The full story is published elsewhere, so just a few pictures to give you an idea of how it can work. 
The original house was 4 rooms made with the never straight offcuts from timber logs in a mill nearby.
This means for all its life of 100 years , the neighboring animals come visiting in search of sharing the wonders that the busy new colonists have brought to the area. There is no condemnation for such productive and busy migrants-- only a quiet joy that they are the ones who are prepared to work hard to get the good stuff. For how much longer though, we ought to ask !


It's true that some of the original inhabitants have become little more than parasites under the leadership of the new colonists ( look up the word - it doesn't have the malintent that many now give it ) . The parasites action of course risks the whole ecosystem if it keeps going - so that that maladjustment must be cut off - to keep going there must be "fences","gates " discipline and cooperative contributions in the new home. 

By putting new aluminum glass and plastic we have been able to close the doors - to welcome only those visitors who we want in our space and who pay their way. Currently the only other residents  besides the big long natural ones are a cat and a chook and they all have to stay mostly outside --- fighting their own natural battles for food . I fear we should do more for the chook, Its cold and the foxes are about. 

Here are a few pictures until I can back to tell you more of the history of this 40 square metres of home.