I watched a few episodes of an old TV-favourite during Christmas. The title is taken from a famous folk song, and it roughly translates to “We live where no one would believe that anyone could live”. There was a time when I watched a lot of that type of shows, people that had chosen an alternative lifestyle, some for idealistic reasons, and some because it was financially smart. In addition to this Norwegian one, I remember Tiny House Nation and Treehouse Masters, and a lot of blogs and You tube channels that provided inspiration. In terms of story telling, I still like the Norwegian show best.
The idea is to find families that live so far away from anything than many of us can’t understand how they could possibly be happy there, but sometimes the story is more important than the location. I used to work with a man who appeared in one of the episodes. He was married to Jenny Hampe Endresen, and the story focused mostly on her. She was from Westport, Connecticut, and apparantly grew up in a pretty upscale neigbourhood. Two of her childhood neighbours were reportedly Paul Newman and Robert Redford.
She was clearly destined for a different life than she decided to pursue. I’m not sure how she discovered the “Walden Pond-lifestyle”, but she eventually met a Norwegian man that shared her interest in the environment and cultivating the land. They moved to Norway, but the marriage ended. She then met Ole Endresen and that’s how she ended up in Vinje, Telemark, where this episode is from. It’s a good story, even though this farm isn’t remote at all. There was no running water and electricity, and they didn’t have a road, but this property wasn’t far from a major county road.
I enjoyed this kind of programmes, but they also provoke me a little. There is an assumption, a story many like to tell, that being different has never been easier. We have developed a society that is so much more tolerant than previous versions, but the truth is that it’s hard for many of us to make the decisions some of these people have made. I lived for four years in the same community as the Endresen family, and I really liked that region. West-Telemark consists of six municipalities and roughly 7 500 km², with a total population of only 12 000. I wish they had been open to newcomers, but I found them to be quite the opposite, which is why I moved away.
There are many myths we like to tell. Our willingness to accept diversity is one of them. There is a financial question involved, and there are limits to how alternative you can get before authorities start reining you in. It’s not illegal to build a tiny house, or to live in a boat, van, or a ship container. It’s not technically illegal to live completely off the grid (electricity, water, and sewage), as there are alternatives. It’s not illegal to produce your own food either, but there will be obstacles if you try.
You’d think that you could park a mobile home, and stay for as long as you wanted on your own land, but you can’t. There are different restrictions in different countries, and I think it’s two months in Norway. Building a tiny house isn’t that straightforward either. The building codes are made for a traditional and larger house, and bureacracy isn’t any better here than in other countries. I’m reminded of Charles Dickens’ Little Dorrit and Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Having limited space, you naturally want to use the height as much as possible, but a mezzanine would probably have been a problem. The requirement is that the window is big enough for you to escape through in case of fire, but many wouldn’t be able to meet this requirement.
Many have also found it difficult to live in boats. The law stated a few years ago that all citizens had to have a permanent address. You couldn’t do anything, not even buy a cell phone without it. People got around that by using a friend’s address, but there are additional problems if you have a family. When the law changed it was possible to live in a boat, but the requirement now is that you park your boat in a marina, or some other place where you have access to electricity, water and sewage. You are probably not going to pay less than a regular house-owner. It can be done, but it’s strongly discouraged.
There have been many news articles trying to convince us of what a bad idea a tiny house would be, and price is the most common argument. The total price of a tiny house is lower than of a big house, but it is correct that the price per m² is higher. I still think the argument is too simplistic, because there are many advantages of minimalism. A smaller house is easier to clean, heat, and not the least to maintain. It’s also reasonable to assume that the amount of emissions and the amount of energy that went into producing the materials, is considerably lower for a tiny house.
I’m writing a lot about neurodevelopmental disorders, and my agenda is to promote independence. A tiny house could be a lifelong lifestyle, but it could also be a first step towards something bigger. It makes independence easier to accomplish. I’d like to see small communities of for example aspies. There could be a dozen tiny homes together in a village like this, with the community spirit we don’t always find in society. That’s what minimalism could do.
Incidentally, the lifestyle minimalism, says that we should only live with the things we really needed. Could you do it? There are different definitions, but it’s basically a tool that can help you find more freedom. I wouldn’t be able to do an extreme form of minimalism, but I always try to implement some of the philosophy. It may sound like a cliché, but life is frequently better with less. I listened to Joshua Fields and Ryan Nicodemus’ podcast the Minimalists for a while too, but it’s never as simple as they claim. I don’t know how many times I’ve read news stories concerning different public agencies, where the main objection they have towards the parents was that they were different.
Doing things in ways that are not done in Norway could be difficult, if you are different in a way people don’t approve of. I still like the idea of less sound, less drama, less worries, less clutter in general. I sometimes feel that the alternative is life skills without the first s.
I am more 