[Ludi]

My profession is totally useless post peak (I'm also an artist) but that doesn't keep me from learning new skills which will be useful in the future. Besides, learning new skills throughout life has been shown to be vital to continuing brain health into old age.

[Madpaddy]

I agree with the poster here who are frustrated by not being able to prepare more due to a lack of finances. I have hit a brick wall in this regard also. I am already up to my eyes in debt (albeit at a fixed rate). I am in a government job which is totally secure unless the country is seized by a foreign power and that didn't work out too well for the last guys who tried.

I am considering

a.) Carrying out a heist or more probably

b.) Getting inot even more debt

I can't take the chance 5 years down the road of not being able to run my well pump for want of a renewable energy system I could have put in by borrowing the money now. Of course, the banks may not even loan me more money. The other alternative is putting the few grand of saving I have into oil or gold futures but I'm not even sure how this works or the risks involved !!!

[mgibbons19]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Madpaddy', 'I') agree with the poster here who are frustrated by not being able to prepare more due to a lack of finances. I have hit a brick wall in this regard also. I am already up to my eyes in debt (albeit at a fixed rate). I am in a government job which is totally secure unless the country is seized by a foreign power and that didn't work out too well for the last guys who tried.

I am considering

a.) Carrying out a heist or more probably

b.) Getting inot even more debt

I can't take the chance 5 years down the road of not being able to run my well pump for want of a renewable energy system I could have put in by borrowing the money now. Of course, the banks may not even loan me more money. The other alternative is putting the few grand of saving I have into oil or gold futures but I'm not even sure how this works or the risks involved !!!

[crapattack]

Heinekin said:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'Y')ou mean "Your Money or Your Life"? Great! If a revised and updated version is available, perhaps that's what you got. You're in for a treat and maybe even a "conversion."

[AnniCat]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crapattack', '
')Wow, another artist Sweet. Artists are good at adapting I find, and we're usually good observers too. Personally I love learning new things and as I get a bit older I almost sure I've forgotten just as much. Maybe it's jut wishful thinking but I think artists will have a place. People will need creativity. The pre-industrial world valued it more than our modern one.

[crapattack]

AnniCat, sorry it's taken a couple days to return your post. Yes, it is good to ruminate on what we will gain in the future, it helps us deal with what we will loose.

I really wanted to think about your post and Ludi's, Heinekin's, and Coyote's, because I think we artists on this thread are asking a fundemental question about whether we will be able to be artists in this future world, whether we know it or not. Pondering this has lead me to see that the world will always need art. We've been drawing on cave walls since the dawn of time and it's not so much a profession as a drive. With me and other artists I know desire to make art is an irrepressible urge to that must be expressed in a certain media, but it doesn't take to being suppressed all that well. Different artists have different processes, naturally, we wouldn't want it any other way. But one thing we do share is a basic human need to know and understand our world, and artists will always be there to interpret and communicate our understandings. Whether this is making marks on stones with blood and berry juice or with adobe illustrator, you can't kill this drive. Even when we have nothing to make a mark with, we see the world in ways different from other folks, and everything that we say and do reflects this 'other angled' perspective.

In the world to come it may be that captital A 'Art' it will not be a trade for a while. It's possible we'll just need to figure out how to live in the new paradigm, but chances are some people will want their community to reenact something they saw or did and will put on a piece of theatre to educate and entertain themselves. Someone will want to and have the time to communicate illustratively to another, or simply describe that beautiful flower visually and draw or paint it. In our houses we will still want the dust swept up and things to look nice, I see no reason why we won't arrange the funiture, design better things to use, paint on walls or pieces of fabric as we always have.

I don't think we need to despair for art, all it needs is for us to continue to draw, paint or whatever it is we do with or without computers. No matter where we go from here art and design will be right there with us just as it always has been.

[crapattack]

Heineken wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'Y')ou mean "Your Money or Your Life"? Great! If a revised and updated version is available, perhaps that's what you got. You're in for a treat and maybe even a "conversion." As I said, I didn't do the wall chart---I'm not that anal. What worked for me was just becoming intensely conscious of the money coming in and going out. Eliminating waste. Eliminating debt. Redefining my perception of what money actually is (life energy). And saving consistently. Changing how I lived, basically. The funny thing is that I soon didn't feel as though I was sacrificing anything. Instead, I felt truly empowered for the first time.

[Revi]

I too am an artist. They say the most creative thing you do with an art degree is figure out a way to make a living. Well, it's true. Lately I have begun to realize that the artist's perspective is very valuable in dealing with the world that's coming. I was depressed for quite a while and then started to create things to deal with what's coming. I think that the other people around me aren't as creative, so it will hit them harder. As long as I'm creating something I am full of positive energy. As soon as I'm not, my mind fills with dark thoughts. I'd rather be creating things. Here's what we did to our house to get ready for peak oil:

http://www.msad54.org/sahs/appliedarts/ ... /index.htm

You can also find my art and my maple sugarhouse on the site as well.

[crapattack]

Hey Revi, thanks for the links I am so jealous of your sugarhouse - you will do very well with that post-crash as I figure people will really want sugar. I liked your carving too.

I figure us artists have a lot to contribute, mostly it's our ability to problem solve in creative ways, I think. And how we look at the world. Most of us are great with our hands, and let's face it, just because all we have to eat is some things from the garden doesn't mean we won't want to create things for pleasure. Art has always flourished in times of need.

[Revi]

Thanks Crapattack. Our little sugarhouse may help out post peak, but it's fun to do now. I do it with a friend who is a forester. It's a great little farm for the regular person. We get firewood and maple syrup from it. Every little bit helps the family budget out. Our solar hot water has been getting to over 100 degrees lately, even though the temp outside is in the low teens. I guess it just needs sun, not warmth to work. It gives me hope to see this stuff work!

[Laurasia]

I've enjoyed reading this thread. I get depressed about my situation also. Middle-aged, living in the suburbs of a big violent city, working a job that may not last too much longer. But reading your posts here has made me feel much more hopeful. I guess I just keep my goals tucked away in the back of my mind and try to achieve just one little thing a week (like squirreling away a couple of dollars in the old shoebox - my secret stash of cash!) and it makes me feel like I've accomplished something.

Well thanks for the compassion on this thread.

Regards,

L.

[crapattack]

Revi said
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')hanks Crapattack. Our little sugarhouse may help out post peak, but it's fun to do now. I do it with a friend who is a forester. It's a great little farm for the regular person. We get firewood and maple syrup from it. Every little bit helps the family budget out. Our solar hot water has been getting to over 100 degrees lately, even though the temp outside is in the low teens. I guess it just needs sun, not warmth to work. It gives me hope to see this stuff work!

[AmericanEmpire]

We're doomed. Even intelligent people don't understand what we are facing. And most the population is not what I'd call intelligent.

I talk to a friend today that I haven't talked too since my college days. Anyways, I gave him the peak oil gospel.

Didn't believe it. Technology will prevail in the end. We got nanotechnology, hydrogen, and new solar cell technology. People just don't want their world view busted and will rationlize away.

Never mind all the materials that are build with and transported with oil. Alternative energies are derivatives of oil. People just don't get it.

Don't get exponential growth. And how big our energy use would be if we could keep growing. Its just impossible to believe we are gonna continue the way we have been when you look at the numbers. People don't look at the numbers. They just believe what they want.

[rogerhb]

Average people are frightening, and amazingly they are allowed to vote.

Voting booths should be designed so the pen is tied on a short string to the left hand side of the table and printed in colour like the Ishihara eye tests so people need at least some dexterity and weed out colour blind people while you are at it.

[crapattack]

AE, I actually have been feeling pretty down about that particular issue lately and have been having to work pretty hard on keeping my own spirits up. I'm trying but sometimes it's so frustrating for exactly the reasons you mention.

Whenever they come up with this sh*t I just feel like "oh no, here we go again". Lately I've just been smiling politely and not engaging them, I just don't have the energy to get into an argument or educate them up when sure as hell they'll just cling to their beliefs anyway and treat me like a crazy evangelist (scarely thought, maybe I am!).

Worst thing is they can see I'm down and want to cheer me up with all their electric car happy talk, thinking it's going to make me see the light.

I'm happy that there's lots on this forum who get it, but in the physical world - not many - like you say, even some that should. Oh well, I don't know why it makes me so depressed, I must have a very naive impression of people. Perhaps I should be glad of their stupidity, so I'll be ahead of the curve for preparation and all that. I just wish more would act to save themselves. I feel like a vulcanologist a year before Pompei ...

[rogerhb]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crapattack', 'I') feel like a vulcanologist a year before Pompei ...

[RacerJace]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crapattack', '.')..
Whenever they come up with this sh*t I just feel like "oh no, here we go again". Lately I've just been smiling politely and not engaging them, I just don't have the energy to get into an argument or educate them up when sure as hell they'll just cling to their beliefs anyway and treat me like a crazy evangelist (scarely thought, maybe I am!).

Worst thing is they can see I'm down and want to cheer me up with all their electric car happy talk, thinking it's going to make me see the light.

...

[Liamj]

A good chunk of my 'preparation' to date has consisted of trying to sell the holistic perspective to my nearest and dearest, who think they understand/already know because they're greenies. Unfortunately, living in the inner city does not make you independant of oil! Add the self-fulfilling maxim that if can't do anything about a problem, not interested in it, and we have a near-lock.

I too find having a kid actually eases me, because a) play clears the mind, & b)i might thru her aid the future by better equipping her to deal with it. Hence, i am eg. battling currently to stop, for one month even, the river of new stuff she gets given by the adults around her: I see that as creating brain damage, an unsustainable expectation that will do her no favours in most of the likely futures.. luckily i don't crave popularity. I started her in physics before math, writing can wait. But how to get her to like the chickens?

[Ludi]

If you want her to like the chickens and want to learn to take care of them, get her some very cute bantams as pets, but don't expect her to eat them later! I'm raising some Silkies, which are supposed to be especially good mothers. They will look pretty much like pom poms when they grow up, their feathers are more like fur.

http://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/product ... lkies.html

[rogerhb]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'I')f you want her to like the chickens ...