Maybe it was just PMS, but I got really emotional over the Tiny documentary last week. I had originally watched it with my mom a few weeks ago, and found myself re-watching it a few times last week, and really, "getting it". I'll probably watch it again. I think for me, I just really like the idea of building a completely self sustaining, mobile, little house. Plus, the style that Shafer designed are just so darn cute. Like tiny little slices of Scandinavian bliss. I have no design ideas, so I need I'll most like copy one of his, to avoid building an ugly shed on wheels. I already have two ugly sheds staring me in the face every day. I don't need another one!
The tiny houses also remind me of when I sued to live out of my sleeper cab as a trucker. Only I didn't have lovely finishes, a sink, a stove, a shower, ect. But I do know how it is to live simply, out of something not much bigger than you. And it can be cozy, and it can be claustrophobic. When living in a truck, you're usually parked in an area that would make wandering off for a walk, a little tricky, or down right dangerous. Or, I often would drive past life happening, like hiking trails next to rivers in Idaho, and Pennsylvania. I don't exactly miss living humbly out of my truck. The loneliness and boredom resulted in a lot of retail indulging.
Now I live in a small house, and I shouldn't consider myself less a person for living in more than 200 square feet of space. Just like I don't think any different of people who live in a fancy shed. The Tiny House movement has become almost a strict religious experience for some. I read a review for a book by a Tiny Houser, and the reviewer was criticizing the author for building a 1500 sqft home. But the author and family decided to live in a tiny house for a while to get out of debt and regroup. Now it's becoming, with some, a case of who can go smallest? Not me, I'm at 1082, and there are times when I'm wishing for another room to hide in. I was going outside for some peace, but it's high summer, and the cacophony of crickets and locusts is worse than the ringing in my ears that I'm fleeing outside to mend. It's a small farm house, built in 1943. It has an open format, so we are all essentially together all the time. So this is good and bad. Just depends. I like our Wee house, and I'm working to create some outside living space to help increase the living space. Even if it's only psychological. These types of projects are slow going though. With just a shovel, and myself to work with, and no budget. Currently the yard looks like some one got drunk and rented a back hoe and had some crazy fun. No, it's just me, with my ADD, working on multiple projects at once.
It's time like these, when I'm trying desperately to dig the Georgia clay, to level out the yard, sweating like a ferrel hog, and getting no where, that I can see the perks of a tiny house. I still want to build one. For the experience of building something myself, and to have a tiny little house to retreat into, or refuge in if we have power outages. I think they're really cool, and if I was single, I'd live in one today! But as a family of 3, we'd need 3 of those, one for each of use, and at $30-60K per tiny house, that would add up quick. So for now I will dwell in my small house, and think about solar panels, geothermal heat pumps, LED lights, organic gardening, and maybe building a tiny house over time. I still got that huge ugly shed to address.
My take away from the Tiny doc, for me, is don't worry so much about house stuff, try not to let the house own you, and don't hang onto stuff, if there's an empty space, let it be empty, don't fill it with stuff, and don't engage in retail therapy. Which our new budget had nipped. Also, don't feel like less of a person, just because I have 2 pants and a few shirts. That's all I need, because I don't go anywhere. I just need an outfit for going into public with. And don't buy clothes I don't normally wear, that included shoes. I'll just feel weird when I try to put them on to go to the store, and then I'll never wear them, and they'll just sit in the closet, and back at Goodwill where they came from. I'm a plain sorta person. I just like my jeans, my running shoes or flips, my T-shirts, and my pink and grey rain jacket. Some one once asked, "why don't we you buy ourselves some new clothes?", because we'd been wearing the same ones for a while. Well, because there's nothing wrong with the ones I'm wearing. I get a lot of hand me downs. Like I'm the pre-stop before Goodwill. I don't care, sometimes I get a goodie out of it. In return I complete the cycle.
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