NBRC

It's fall and in some odd seasonal/ritualistic yearning, I find myself writing down the current status here in Mauk as the weather turns cooler and the leaves change color. We've also found an interesting balance between convenience and progress since we have made the decision to move down the hill. What we are doing, what we are building do we in no way claim is the way any one else should build or live. We moved down the hill, as we refer to the house we are building about half a mile from the one room trailer we four (my wife and two teen age children) have lived in during the last couple of years, because I had to move closer to the house. Thus without any real consultation with the rest of the family did I began the move. My wife with 25 years experience in dealing with my quirkiness fell into step right away. My two teenagers are still in denial. In reality my wife and I simply did not want to spend another winter in the trailer, good, bad or indifferent.

To begin this part of the Newberry adventure, I started to break things down by function. Now this idea just didn't jump out at me. It was because I realized how many projects had been started and stopped and started again and how much remained to be done. Piles of tools in one spot. Piles of materials in another spot. Just keeping focused and not being overwhelmed by the sear number of things to accomplish was a task in itself. I had learned earlier that if any task is too complicated or overwhelming that it should be broken down into smaller and smaller tasks until it could be handled both mentally and physically. It sounded good in theory and I believe it works but it is often hard to keep up when a project has lasted as long as our project has lasted. I sat down and took a good look at where we were at this point in time and space and began to break down our life by function.

The first function that had to be looked at was work. Since I work from home I needed to have an office where I could place my computer equipment. The house was still under construction and an earthen home under construction means a lot of dirt, which is not good for computer equipment. Luckily we found an old airstream trailer from the local salvage yard called Tab's. I pulled it up and my new office was born. We put a bed in the trailer and not only was it the world headquarters for the Natural Building Resource Center, it was the "Luv" shack as well. Hey I did mention the four of us had been living in a one-room trailer, the privacy of a separate sleeping space was a real treat.

Since ole man winter was on his way, the next function to consider was keeping warm. Not that it gets all that cold in middle Georgia, but still it can drop in the below freezing for day or two and we had no outer walls at all. The plan is to cob the outer walls and that wasn't going to happen in a weekend. The decision was made to wrap the house in plastic. I should mention that another fellow joined our little group and his name is Joe Milosh. He is the one that should get credited with this idea. The idea is that as we cob up the wall, we just peal up the plastic. I placed the plastic such that I'd cob from the inside so that even if it was a bit cold, I could build a fire to warm up as I was cobbing away. Joe had solved his living situation much quicker than we had, he found an old school bus at Tab's and had it pulled to the site. Within a couple of weekends he had a really nice living space.

Since we weren't going to sleep in the house at the moment, I wanted to put up some quick space for the kids. I found a reconditioned 9 x 21-foot tent with two bedrooms and put it up on a platform. I found a couple of oil filled electric heaters since they don't burn oxygen and thus I had bedrooms for the kids. So far my son says he is going to stay up the hill and the heck with sleeping down here with the chickens. My Daughter has been staying up at the top of the hill till the other day when she had her four impacted wisdom teeth removed via oral surgery. Thus the office/Luv shack became the office/medical recovery center. My wife and daughter stayed in the airstream while I got the opportunity to test out the tent and the oil filled electric heater. Man did I stay cozy and warm. Alone, but cozy and warm, well at least it was for a good cause. Besides that meant that when my daughter needed something in the middle of the night, I wasn't the one being woke up.

The primary source of hot water at this point is a single on-demand hot water facet. This had been used for most of our hot water needs, from dishes to tea, to washing our bodies. A on-demand hot water heater sits, with a light layer of dust awaiting its turn in the work schedule. Since so much plastering remained, the floor was not finished, but some discarded carpet was found and laid down to help keep the dust down till a floor could be poured. Strategies for dealing with cold weather are being developed as the weather turns cooler. Leaks in the roof are being discovered and fixed. During the last rain not a single leak was found. Hot plates, an electric grill, a rice cooker, and a bread maker share the single electric outlet each allotted it's cycle of energy in due time. I have lots of plans for various non-electric gadgets but these non-grid options remain in the blue print stage. A wood burning stove was put in as our only source of heat. Overall, however I can at least boast that we are under the average total electric usage for the American family. Sadly that ain't hard to do.

When one moves into a location that is not technically ready for human occupancy, one finds that an awareness of basic functions of life increases dramatically. Going to the bathroom in the middle of the night now involves finding a pair of shoes, stumbling into the cool night air; saying hello to the poopy dog and hoping that some remnant of your body heat will remain in the warm snuggly blanket so recently left behind. Suddenly the task of building and designing the bathroom gains an enthusiasm and momentum not unlike a psychological whip moving the structure toward completion and comfort.

Design becomes evolution as an old desk is covered and placed in the kitchen on the dirt floor to serve as a workstation. Then it is moved and moved again till it settles into its proper place or it is replaced by something nicer and more appropriate. While function supercedes beauty they lie on the same scale joined by the actions of living in a space and caring for that space. Sometimes, however, that distance can seem long.

Well now that you have the flavor of our journey at this point, check out the photos and techniques we are using on this adventure. When I started, natural building meant building with the things that nature provides and I've now come to realize that man too is part of nature. For me at least, natural building means using the materials at hand. Old carpet scrapes and discarded wooden slates join clay and straw. I've learned by looking at God's creatures around me and see that the field mouse will use our trash just as it will use leaves and twigs. Unfortunately we seem to be moving away from that idea. The building codes of today are becoming less understanding of experimental ideas. The primary goal of building seems to be increasing the monetary value of the house rather than providing shelter. The option to build as I have built will become less of an option in more and more locations. Since I have started building this house the county in which I live has adopted new building codes. I do not know that I could build this house here today had I not already obtained my building permit.

I don't know what the answer is, but I do know that reducing our choices is not the answer. Perhaps just letting folks know what it can be done and serving as and example is all I can do at this point. Perhaps that is our real function here.

Well check out the photos and keep in touch.

Love and Light

Pat, Carroll, Pat Jr., Consuela and Joe

Mauk Georgia

The photos are as follows:

Photo 1

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Photo 10

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