I have been writing and unwriting. Weaving and unraveling words. I have had profound thoughts that had no language and language that could not form thoughts. So while I have had so much to share with you all lately, I have not been able to create a wordful composition to express it.

Mainly what is on my mind is the lack of control most of us have. Though I wish I could singelhandedly bring peace and harmony to the world and restore the environmental damage being perpetuated on our one and only habitat, I can not. All I can do is find peace within myself and steward my own little plot of land.

This project was originally created for a college course I am taking called Art & Ecology that I have thoroughly enjoyed. It forced me to complete an idea I had been playing with for a while, which is to create an altar that will give people a place to go to to pray for healing for the Earth, a small way to give back and commune with our big mama.

Altars to the Earth are site-specific nature based mandala-like temporary creations meant to draw people’s attention back to the land.

Funny anecdote, at one point while creating one of the altars a couple from Long Island, New York were sitting on a bench behind us talking on the phone complaining about how there is nothing to do in Taos, while gazing out at the beautiful Rio Grande Gorge and seven majestic Big Horn Sheep. We rolled our eyes. If this is nothing, then I don’t know what something is. See if you can spot the sheep in the video.

I hope that you might consider creating your own Altars to the Earth in your neighborhood or a nearby tourist location. This video shows you how easy it is to do. You don't have to make five, one is enough. And you don't need to paint any rocks. If you do create an altar, please share it here in the comments or with me directly.

Gardening in the desert creates a lot of challenges. We have a small garden but any amount of gardening helps to save money. Also, its enjoyable to be outside digging in the soil and growing your own food. I love harvesting vegetables that I nourished from seed to fruit. I feel a great deal of accomplishment. As someone who enjoys cooking, growing my own food and creating new recipes with said food, makes me feel like a true provider for my family and a highly capable human.

The main issues of desert gardening are water, sun, soil and wind. In this video, I mostly focus on water and how we utilize our grey water system to save water. I also use a drip irrigation system to help save water. I mention how we created garden beds by digging them into the ground and filling them with gardening soil. I discuss how I use shade cloths for sun to cover my greens. Bugs and weeds are rarely a problem.

You will also notice in the video that we have corrugated metal fences around the garden. These are used to block the strong winds that come primarily from the southwest. All this also serves to create a microclimate around the garden that keeps moisture in and helps prevent the topsoil from drying out.

In the future, we will have an attached greenhouse that will also use grey water from the house. Perhaps next year, I can create another video with an update on how the greenhouse has changed our food production.

Here is my garden version of the Jennifer Aniston salad, which is kind of a version of a Mediterranean salad. (Thanks to my friend Mel for this recipe. She grills the zuchinni, which I chose not to do but sounds tasty.)

Zucchini Salad

In this latest installment of the Our Uncertain Future podcast, Eric and Johanna delve into a little of their philosophy behind living off grid, and it’s not what you usually hear on the topic. The conversation expands upon this installment of the newsletter from earlier this year:

⚠️Warning: If you don't like potty talk, I advise you to skip this post completely.

As I say in the video above (also available in audio if you don't want to look at a toilet for 7 minutes), sometimes being an environmentalist is messy and weird and it's not cool. That kind of sums up the compost toilet.

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Some people think it's cool because they haven't tried it. Some people think it's weird. And it is weird because it's an unusual lifestyle choice, especially in the developed world. Some people think it's gross and it certainly is if you think about it too much. But the fact that it is good for the environment, especially in the desert, far outweighs the gross factor.

There's nothing gross happening in the sensory realm, only in the mental realm. There is no sight or smell that makes it gross to use (maybe sometimes to clean, but that's true for any toilet). It is gross to think about composting human fecal waste in your home. Then again, all toilets are kind of gross if you think about it too much. Like when I go to a public bathroom, I often think, though I try not to, that some stranger’s butt was on this seat, pooping. It's the inevitable hazard of using a bathroom, which we do multiple times a day.

Do you have a compost toilet? Are you considering getting one?

This is the toilet we have. It appears to currently retail for about $1800. So, it was an investment up front, but we’ve already had it for 4 years and will continue to use it indefinitely. Here are the products we use for our toilet. Here is the book I reference, Humanure Handbook, and a great resource for DIY compost toilets.

This the post I reference in the video where I wrote about our compost, Dealing With Our Own Crap. (I talk about it briefly in Growing Our Greywater System.) Since writing that piece, Eric has taken over toilet cleaning. He had a clear method on how he wanted to do it and maintain it and I did not argue with him. Please, no, let me clean out the compost toilet every week!

Because we are such introverted homebodies, AKA hermits, we don't have people over often. The occasional overnight guest stays in our camper and uses the outhouse. We have never heard a complaint from guests about the toilet, so I assume people are fine with it.

Have you ever used a compost toilet? What did you think? Was it a commercial brand or DIY?

When I lived in Alaska, I used an outhouse all winter long and it was lovely to go outside to eliminate, to take in the views and the fresh air. Some outhouses didn't bother with doors. It made sense to me then to have the toilet separate from the house. Not convenient but more civilized somehow. Even a dog knows not to poop where you sleep.

Another option I wanted to mention is incinerating toilets. This would not be great for small solar power systems like ours because they require a lot of energy. But we used one when staying in a yurt on the Big Island in Hawaii. The yurt was on lava rocks and on the electrical grid. It also had plumbing but because of the lava rocks, they could not have a septic tank. The incinerator toilet reminded me a lot of our SunMar except without the compost. Basically, after you poop, instead of flushing, you incinerate and it all turns to ash and goes in a drawer like the one we have to empty later. This seems a lot more pleasant than compost though it can’t be used for soil because all of the nutrients are burned out of it. The process does produce greenhouse gases so it’s not as eco-friendly as a compost toilet.

Another cool option is a bio-toilet, which converts human waste into cooking gas. You can read more about it at Acorn Labs. This is not a viable choice for us becuase it requires year round warm temperatures, which we do not have, nor do we have the space to contain the full biogas converter in a heated room.

Hope this info helps if you are considering alternatives to flush toilets for any reason.

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Johanna and Eric go a little deeper on what has always drawn Jo to swim outside the mainstream. For context, read Jo’s newsletter - “What Compels Me to Live This Way?”

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The Our Uncertain Future podcast is now listed on Apple Podcasts, where anyone can subscribe to all our free episodes.

You can also add our podcast feed to the player of your choice manually using this link:

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We dig in to discuss one of our biggest challenges with living off-grid so far, why it took Eric the better part of a year to address it and how he brilliantly parlayed his stubbornness into an epic Christmas gift.

The Our Uncertain Future podcast is now listed on Apple Podcasts, where anyone can subscribe to all our free episodes.

You can also add our podcast feed to the player of your choice manually using this link:

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Starting to seem like someone might have a second act in marketing in his future…

The debut of the Our Uncertain Future podcast delves into the details of our last newsletter, the mounting solar cycle and the risks it poses to all things electric.

Please share any thoughts, comments or questions below. You can also get in touch with us at [email protected].

Stay tuned. We’re just getting started building out this homestead.