Really? I read that and I got to say it kind of gave me chicken skin while reading it. I'm out in the country too and when some stranger comes a knockin' I've got a Billy(old wooden baseball bat with nails driven into the barrel so if I clock somebody with it, I have to press my boot onto their skull so as to extract the spikey end out of their cranium) that I keep next to the door for just an occasion. That is if the stranger is not friendly. haven't had occasion to use it yet, but there have been time when I was reaching for it while determining the situation. You have strange people wander onto your property regularly, Frank?
Strangers walk in here because they know somebody's here, but that somebody can't hear them knocking on the door or rapping on the window (something they don't know at the time).
I leave the place unlocked; I'm the only human being for miles and miles around, and if someone's in trouble on the highway or something, and doesn't have a cellular telephone, I'm it. I consider it a public service, a refuge or haven in time of trouble.
Not to worry, on three counts. Number one, I'm the last person who's ever going to live in this house, which is very ancient and falling apart. As soon as I'm gone, the whole edifice comes tumbling down, being replaced by five or six family homes each on its own ample lot, depending upon how badly 0bama continues screwing up the economy.
Because the house is so old and decrepit, there's no point in locking it. A kitten could break in here, if it wished to.
And number two, there is nothing of value kept here; what's here wouldn't bring $200 in a garage sale. It's very minimal. All that's important to me is in a locked storage place in town (family heirlooms and somesuch), or in a bank safe-deposit box in town, or in a large business safe in another town. About the only thing of value out here are the cats; nothing else that if I lost, I couldn't replace within half an hour, and cheaply so.
What's in the glove compartment of the car has more value than what's in this whole house.
And finally, number three, there are three farmers and one automotive mechanic out here at least once a day (individually) because after I moved out here to this isolated place, they discovered it's a great place to store their equipment and to work on it. Plus the property caretaker, who's in charge of a lot of acreage that's scattered around the county, but this is the best place for him to keep his stuff, and so he drops by at least two times a day.
One time--in late 2005--I broke an ankle while dealing with a fallen tree, but rather than being like the bitter old Vermontese cali primitive, I didn't bother trying to get help (no telephone here). I knew someone was going to drop by--I didn't know who, but someone. And so I just stayed still and waited. And I was right; in something less than an hour, someone dropped by, and all was tended to.
One time the sparkling old dude on Skins's island twitted me about being "so isolated;" I read his stupid comment early on a Sunday afternoon, and kept track. At the end of that particular day, 10 p.m. Sunday, there had been
seventeen people out here.
I moved out here for solitude--and really, I'm very far away from things--but in short order (I've been here eight years) I learned I was to have no more solitude out here than I did in congested Omaha.
I'm of course an enthusiastic supporter of the second amendment, but I don't personally own a firearm. I tried learning (about the time conservativecave was created, in early 2007), but the instructor finally admitted defeat. "You're a close-encounter hitting sort of person, not a patiently-focus-take-aim-and-fire sort of person."
Which of course was, or is, true.
My weapons of choice are five S/K adjustable wrenches, with 17" handles and 1-3/8" spannage. strategically placed around here. A person with a gun would just put a hole in someone, and be satisfied. Me, given my temperament, I probably wouldn't stop until I'd clubbed a malicious person into bloody clumps of flesh and bone.
But happily, there's never been a problem, or a situation even close to perilous. Over the years, all intruders here have been utterly harmless; a few have even run away upon seeing me, before I could find out what they wanted.
I've been enured to sudden surprises--people coming at me from behind, or from the sides, myself unaware they're there because I can't hear--since childhood. It just happens, and one just deals with it.
As for being caught in the natural state, I long ago learned that nonchalance, confidence, nerves of steel, and riveting eye-contact makes the surprise "visitor" not even notice my undress.
