A year to live more locally and wisely

With the start of 2009 and the current global economic situation that exists in much of the world (especially those in North America, Europe and the Far East, where those who live with greater debts of burden more likely live), a resolution we have made (in our household) is to raise more home-grown foods and eat more locally grown food as well. Also, to reduce use of credit and use cash more, to lessen the noose of debt upon ourselves.

To this end, we’re planning to convert our front-yard into a Victory Garden type of garden. Also, we will be canning more food for winter stores and will be trying to live more frugally (taking heed from our grandparents generation). We’ve lived very well over the past generations with the advent of easy credit, loans and mortgages; when used wisely, these offer us the ability to purchase things, houses and pay off unexpected expenses where we mightn’t be able to otherwise; but all to often, we use them poorly and forget to pay them down as quickly as possible (or worse, we think of them as an extension to our salary that we never “really” have to pay-off; to get out of debt, look at using resources like debt counseling or online ones that talk about the “Debt Snowball” like getrichslowly or the spreadsheet version here or What’s the Cost ). Well, with the recent economic crisis, many people (us included) are learning that this way of thinking (of easy credit and not having to be as wise with it as we might have once been) is fool-hardy and leads to long-term “debt slavery” to financial institutions or worse yet.

By living more locally, eating more locally and trying to raise our own food more, we hope to also live less by credit and more by cash on hand. Purchases, formerly of whim or as immediate gratification, will be thought out more now; cash will be saved for the purpose and more thought put into them than what once might have been. To such end, I’ve wanted an iPhone (the 3G model) and though I might want it, I will hold until I can justify it (as I have an iPod Touch and a working cell phone) and pay for it in cash, not credit.

Living more locally will also mean (I hope) making new friends, learning new skills and appreciating the city in which I live for what it can offer (think something like Portland Oregon’s Urban Edibles) to supplement the palate of food we eat from. It also means increasing the interpersonal contact that has seemingly become a scarcer and scarcer facet of modern society as a rule.