Stuck in the past or favoring the old ways.

[PhilNH5]

Today it struck me how much I incorporate the "old ways" into my daily life. By the old ways I mean time tested ways, methods or objects versus a more modern or convenient way.
I get up to a windup alarm clock. Winding it every night at bed time is a ritual. Once out of bed I come down stairs and stoke up the woodstove we use for heat. The windup grandfathers clock lets me know i am on schedule. After letting the dogs out I start the bathroom ritual that has always involved a mug and a brush and just recently a double edged safety razor. Its a relaxing process that yields incredible shaves.
I drive to work in a car with a manual transmission - all of the household vehicles are. Throughout the day I use a self-winding watch to tell time. For fancy dress up affairs I have a pocket watch.

If it is a weekend or very cold I will fire up the wood cookstove and cook a meal in it or on it. Breads turn out great. When the stove is lit there is always a kettle full of water ready for tea. "High tea" is a tradition from my British mother and requires loose tea leaves, preheating the pot (hot the pot) and dainty teacups and saucers. It is best when served with warm scones baked in the wood cookstove.

We cut a lot of our own firewood. or we buy rounds or logs and cut and split as necessary. Most of the splitting is done with a splitting axe.

We also make our own maple syrup, can our home grown spaghetti sauce and strawberry jam.

My friends at work call me a dinosaur. But I am not a complete Luddite. i'm typing this on a wireless laptop. I have and know how to use my cell phone. At work I run a pharmacokinetic lab chock full of the latest greatest analytical technology for a drug company. Maybe because of that I want to slow down and savor things when I get home.

So how about you all? Any tried and true methods you prefer to the modern ways? I'd be interested in hearing about it.

Phil

 

[RobS]

Interesting topic Phil. I'm pretty eclectic with this stuff. I shave with a modern razor but use a mug and brush for the soap. Grind my own coffee beans, then put them in a modern coffee maker. Truck, car and tractor are all "gear" yet I listen to music on an MP3 player. I like tent camping as well as our RV. Don't heat with wood, yet love a fire in the fireplace, and do cut/split my own. Love getting out with nature, as long as my thoroughly modern DSLR camera is with me. Enjoy bicycling when ever I can, even commuting to work... on my carbon fiber bike. Don't really like talking on the phone, yet I have a "smart phone", though it's not as smart as my "old fashioned" palm pilot. I try to teach my boys the ways of working with your hand as well as your brain. That's my biggest struggle lately. On top of that, I prefer to meet with people at work in person and have a discussion with perhaps a gentlemens agreement instead of lengthy emails back and forth. Oh yeah, I like sitting at a table with some friends as well as I like chatting here on TBN!

And yet there is so much more: I love cooking over a fire in a dutch oven, prefer charcoal to propane and shake my own martinis. I will admit to a glass of box wine tonight though...

 

[Matt_Jr]

Interesting subject. I find I try to be as modern as possible, using cell phones, internet, watching tv on the DVR(digital video recorder), even have those thermometers that send a radio signal to the clocks that are automatically set by the atomic clock out west. But..... I long for power outages when we are forced to use the grill instead of the stove, heat the house with the fireplace(I want to install a wood stove or furnace) and use oil lamps to read instead of watching tv. I like smoking a cigar on the front porch with a glass of bourban on ice watching the sun set in the summer after a hard days work. I love studying older technologies. I keep some string near my recliner to practice complex knots that I have to look in a book to remember the names of. I really wish I would have lived a few hundred years ago when times were simpler, time was valued a little more, and the neighbor was more a friend than a face and name one tries to keep up with. I like acoustic guitars over electric but play both. I like passing the time playing the trumpet or piano more than video games, eventhough they can be fun too. To me a handshake and a look in the eye is better than a signature. I'd rather listen to older, wiser men tell stories of their past than watch the latest episode of any primetime show. Just yesterday, I was playing guitar with a man that played banjo and fiddle with people like Keith Whitley, Ricky Scaggs, and the Statler Brothers, just to name a few, next to his wood stove, and thought it was the coolest thing in the world. He came by my job during my lunch breaks to teach me how to play blue grass last summer(coming from jazz and blues it's taking quite a bit for me to pick up on). Stuff like that is golden to me. Much better than going to the movies or a theme park. I even find myself climbing trees out in the woods just to have a nicer view, and using a compass or the sun on a clear day over a gps. Heck, one day I'd like to study celestial navigation just for fun. Who does stuff like that? Must be something wrong with me, 'cause at 31 I sometimes feel like an old man still trying to gain experience and wisdom.

 

[2manyrocks]

You still can't get true concert grand piano sound from any electronic keyboard I know of.

 

[rdln]

Hmm....smoke a corn cob pipe, listen to country on AM station that goes off at sunset, I prefer revolvers, grind beans but dont roast them, Cut our Xmas trees from the back field, You'll see me with a pennslyvania tuxedo most of the winter, My tipups have to be made of wood, put down my own tarred dog and bury it myself, Wear a dress hat (felt stetson), have made syrup, have made sauerkraut, listen to XM old time radio station alot (ironic huh?), drive autos but like to lock in the front hubs myself, prefer real fireplace but dont have any at the moment. I am sure lots more, ask my wife.

I think each poster on this thread would have to reveal their age to give accurate read.

I'm 39.

 

[chh]

IMO Slowing down ones lifestyle is a real benefit. Not everything needs to be nuked and done in 30 seconds. Funny you mentioning the shaving brush. I currently use an electric razor, but for several years used a mug and brush, the ritual of it all can be very relaxing experience instead of just blasting through your morning. I am typing this on my laptop, but don't have cable or satelite TV, no home phone(cell only, but that is another story) and live on a ranch trying to live a much simplier life than most people today.

Just saw the age post, looks like I may be the old man so far, late 40's.

 

[Matt_Jr]

You still can't get true concert grand piano sound from any electronic keyboard I know of.

I'd rather play an out of tune piano than a keyboard. Especially during a power outage

 

[Matt_Jr]

but don't have cable or satelite TV,

We had rabbit ears 'till be moved out where they wouldn't pick up. Satelite was required for swmbo

 

[QRTRHRS]

For the most part, my claim to fame would be my habit of not buying into the latest and greatest along with hanging onto things until they cannot be repaired anymore. The exception would be tools. While staying within my budget, I usually purchase a new power tool or two yearly. I am always on the lookout for new non powered hand tools but will also purchase used at the flea markets.

I think taking the time to cook a meal from scratch or bake a loaf of bread or sit and pick some tunes or chat with friends is becoming a real luxury for most of us.

 

[jdbower]

I've found that the best part of being an American is being able to pick and choose the best parts from all the cultures around me. The same is true for picking what era some aspect of life is from. The most interesting to me are the juxtaposition of the old and the new, often I use new technology to provide convenience to old ways. I listen to 40's radio shows on my new Blackberry Storm. I cook with lump charcoal (none of those new fangled briquettes for me!) on a cooker who's history goes back thousands of years, yet the cooker has been updated with modern materials and design and I control the pit temperature using a device that I can connect to through my PC. I have a complex setup to stream video over the Internet through my PC to an XBox 360, and then frequently use it to watch TV shows from the 50s and movies that are even older. People who insist the old ways are always better are often as misguided as those who think the latest always equates to the greatest - in an ideal world we should pick what we like about both the new and the old and merge them.