Skills of a Lifetime

I've recently completed a number of odd jobs that left me thinking about what I have to give to people that want to become more self-sufficient. I have a hard time separating myself from my knowledge base in order to view the skill sets I've accumulated over a lifetime. I do this when I teach bot formally and informally, but don't think about it until I realize that I REALLY do have a set of unique skills. During the installation of the off-grid system for my friend Bruce K. last week I had the chance to work near a friend of his who was doing the wiring for the ac side of the house- the regular outlets and lights. He came onto the site when I was about 15 hours into the wiring of the renewable stuff. He took one look and said something like "I couldn't do that". Here is a guy that has wired hundreds of homes and industries looking at my work and realizing that the work of my 50+ off-grid installations was beyond what he could understand at that time.

I'm finishing up some minor repairs at the local Yoga center in Adams Center. They'd had an outside hose bib freeze and start to leak and the need for an additional 5 outlets in their upstairs
apartment. No biggie for me- I've done hundreds, maybe thousands of this kind of job...the board at the yoga center thinks this is amazing stuff. Which brings me to the topic at hand:
"Small Change"

This was a title for the fair that I'd suggested to Patricia Green, who is chairing the North Country Sustainable Living Fair to be held in Canton, NY this Fall. It is more of how I'd like the 'mood' of the fair to be set. All of the stuff I've learned was simple...it is only the build up over time that makes the total processes complex. You start by replacing a bad switch or outlet. Then you run an additional outlet for a room that has too few. Each activity is seemingly simple. You ask questions...even more importantly you observe how the people before you did the job...after a while you get a 'feel' for what was good work and what was sloppy. Even later you develop a sense of humor about some of the 'more interesting' approaches - jobs like plumbing systems that have been modified with every material known to have ever allowed the passage of water-iron pipe, galvanized pipe, copper pipe, plastic pipe and more have all been found in one home at the same time! I've seen the hot water supply pipe connected to the cold water supply pipe in places (the owner couldn't get his shower hot enough while his toilet tank water was steaming!).

The process isn't so much gaining knowledge but of psychological change. You have to want to do the work. If the desire is there the learning will usually follow easily. Small Change is just what we need...on the personal level and on the world level. Humans don't take to big rapid changes easily, small, incremental changes are what brought us comfort level with the personal computer, i-pods, cell phones, central heating, air conditioning and a hundred thousand other things we take for granted every day. However, many of these things are beyond our ability to control...if they break down we are powerless to repair them. This is my worry- we've built a society so complex that if a series of small catastrophes happen in a particular order then we're
stricken by a world wide disaster...one that may take years to repair or rebuild. And we don't have a fall back position...we can't simply learn what our ancestors knew about growing food, keeping warm, and building stuff for ourselves.

So now is the time to start to accumulate the small changes you will need to weather the big changes ahead. I'm here for you! I will be offering a series of Woodhenge Seminars over the next year to help people get comfortable with the basics of the mechanical and social worlds around them.

A few topics:

Bug out bags: How to prepare to leave before the government picks you up and drops you in a FEMA camp. How to put together a backpack that has the necessities for 4 or more days.
This will also be a primmer on long distance backpacking so it won't all be gloom and doom.
I'm going to try to rope my friend Roy H. an Applachian Trail through hiker to help me with this one. My 6 bug out bags (for family and friends) will be discussed and demonstrated. Roy will go over the higher tech version of lightweight backpacking equipment.

Basics of regular wiring and off-grid wiring
How to repair and add circuits to your home and how off-grid power works.

Basics of growing and preserving food
How to put a garden space together and what to do with the surplus.

Basics of making your own bread
From grinding the flour to eating the breads, crackers, and rolls!

Basics of wood heat
From safe chainsaw use, wood splitter, manual saws and splitters to stacking and burning. How to safely set up a wood burning unit and what to do with the ashes.

Build your own wind turbine
Axial flux designs and others will be discussed and built.

I will also take and of your suggestions. E-mail me at jsjuczak@gisco.net with your ideas and suggest dates!