Tomorrow my wife is going to cut my hair.
In fact she has been cutting my hair every 8 weeks or so since we got married 31 years ago.
That is an amazing 200 free haircuts.
It was primarily for money saving reasons that my wife started cutting my hair. We were rather short of cash when we first got married.
Back in the day a haircut at a barber would have cost around US$10. Now it will be nearer US$20.
So over the years we have saved somewhere in the region of US$3000 - US$4000. A rather useful sum of money.
My hair has in fact been quite a good source of saving.
I haven't used a comb (or a watch for that matter) since I moved to Wales nearly 20 years ago. And 18 months ago I went all-in with the 'No Poo' approach to hair care when I gave up using shampoo.
Although saving the £££ was a big part of my hair strategy, it wasn't the only factor.
We wanted to 'stick it to the man' and wave another small flag for self-reliance.
I wish was practically adept enough to do many more things for myself and up my self-reliance score more.
I did attempt to cut my wife's hair in return but that didn't work out so well. Women's hair is a wee bit trickier.
How useful it would have been if I could serviced my own car all these years, or tiled the bathroom, or fixed the roof.
I can handle raising animals, growing food and cooking but I have never been much of a DIY'er.
There was never any practical subjects for me at school, and whacking my Dad on the head with a hammer when we were building the rabbit hutch rather dented my hopes of much parental tuition.
I wonder what a curriculum would look like if we decided to go all in on teaching the skills of self-reliance to our children. Homeschoolers and unschoolers have got the edge here, but imagine if schools went that way as well.
Education for Self-Reliance... now that would be a thing.
PROJECTS :
A Dollar A Day charitable giving project : July 2018 - summary of donations received and given out
Pennsif's Sustainability Curation Digest for MSP - week ending 19 August 2018
BLOGS :
Pennsif’s Progress #577 – The Organic Goldmine and a three legged dog
Pennsif’s Progress #578 – Mr Goose saves the day
RADIO :
The Alternative Lifestyle Show - Friday 17 August 2018 [recording]
My Life in 8 Songs - Thursday 23 August - with @luzcypher, @prc & @inthenow
[ photograph from unsplash.com ]