Tree Planting, Cabin Stay, The Mandibles
Typical March weather, almost 80 on one day, a dusting of snow on another. Rain, then winds, then sunshine. A little bit greener each day. The grass isn’t growing fast enough to stop feeding the cows all together, but thankfully I’m not needing to feed nearly as much. Lots of firewood cutting and fence fixing early in the week.
Hallie and Hasten are both growing more helpful. On Saturday, Hallie helped Amy at the market with herd share pick ups while Hasten stayed with me to help fix fences after our trip to Marion to deliver herd shares.
Amy took the kids to Knoxville on Monday for a meat delivery. Another meat delivery to Bristol and Kingsport yesterday afternoon. No farmers market for the next couple Saturdays. Back to 8:00-noon every Saturday starting in April.
Usually every March before jumping into the full swing of spring, Amy and I stay a couple nights in one of the rental cabins. It’s the perfect getaway. One, because there’s no place else I’d rather be. Two, we can still get work done. My mom graciously kept all four kids giving us peaceful kidless two night stay at the cabin. We got there just as the sun was setting Wednesday evening. On Thursday morning we filled orders while it rained. Then we planted 35 sugar maples throughout the farm until loading up for the meat delivery that afternoon.
The highlight of the week, especially for the kids, was the long awaited arrival of my brother's baby colt. After weeks of checking on Ginger multiple times a day, they were ecstatic to finally find Ginger with the newborn by her side.
While out fixing fences when Amy and the kids were in Tennessee, I listened to more of The Mandibles by Lionel Shriver with economic warnings of chipping and a cashless society.
“Ever since the chipping, the part of his head that perceived so clearly had gone dead… He did not believe the federal government controlled his mind. He accepted that the chip performed the functions it was purported to. It registered direct deposits of his salary. It deducted the costs of any products he chose to buy. It debited his utility bills… It recorded investments and received state benefits. It subtracted local, state, and federal taxes which totaled 77% of his pay. It communicated his every purchase to the agency known until 2039 as the Internal Revenue Service, what the item cost, when and where he bought it, and the product’s exact description down to the model, serial number, or sell by date. It informed the American tax authorities if he bought a packet of crackers… Any additional income including gift coupons for a birthday, revenue from pawned possessions, baked sale proceeds, and private party poker winnings would also register on the chip and would also be taxed at 77%”
“Chipped, you were a credit card… To the population at large, chipping was promoted as the ultimate convenience and the ultimate in financial security. No more having to carry a wallet or a device that thieves could seize on the street. At self checkout, the terminal simply scanned your head. No more pins or unique 25 digit passwords with numbers and letters and signs.”
“In short order, the whole population would be chipped, and savings, checking, and investment accounts would be eliminated all together, at which point it would be impossible to buy anything, sell anything, or possess any monetary wealth, whatsoever, in the absence of a pinhead sized spy rammed into the back of your neck. That was certainly the plan, and congress was unapologetic about this intention.”
“Together medicare and social security consumed 80% of the federal budget. The labor force shrunk.”
“Government becomes a pricey, clumsy, inefficient mechanism for transferring wealth from people who do something to people who don’t, and from the young to the old, which is the wrong direction.”
If you know me at all, you know my passion for freedom. Shriver accurately points out in the novel that a free society is not a utopian society. The answers to those problems is not dependence on the government. The answers lie in helping ourselves and voluntarily helping each other, which incentivizes meaningful relationships and real community. Freedom comes with risk and responsibility. To remove risk and responsibility is to remove freedom. As the novel transitions to the idea of a free state:
“The free state is an experiment in going backwards… In the short term, loss of automation has really helped the labor market.”
“Tax forms in this (free) state, believe it or not, are one page long… You don’t get a business license or a marriage license, an entertainment license or a liquor license. You do business, get married, entertain yourself, and drink.”
“Is not a utopia… Nobody helps you here unless they want to… We’re expected to make ourselves useful or go away.”
Have a good week.
Will