Independence

I remember going to one of those cemetery walks. One of the characters was a local pioneer woman who had lived out on a farm with her family.  Through the years the children grew up and moved on and and finally her husband died.

There she was, alone, getting older every day, chopping wood, growing her own food in the garden, tending the animals, totally reliant upon herself for everything.  Even company.

She kept a diary, of course, or we would not have known about her at all, but of all the things she wrote about, she seemed to take everything pretty much in stride.

I understand alone and I can make do, but I don't have to boil water to wash my clothes, or grow peas to eat them.  I can go to a library, or store, or just order books through my kindle. I talk to people on the phone, on the computer and I can listen to the radio or watch television.

It is hard for me to actually understand what it was like to live as alone as many people must once have been.  A broken leg might have actually been a death sentence and the flu most certainly could have been fatal. Boredom probably didn't exist, there was too much work to do, but enjoyment had to come from the satisfaction of surviving.

Life on the prairie was for the innovative and strong.