****UPDATE: Re comment below that refers to another blogger talking about the book. It seems that the book was discussed on Oprah! Well. Truly it must be the zeitgeist, because I don't watch Oprah nor do I read the blogger. I saw the book mentioned on Amazon, under "People who are interested in X book, might also be interested in Possum Living." Isn't it strange? Harmonic convergence.
I love reading books about frugality, not so much because I learn many frugal tips (since I know many already), but because I sometimes need a bit of affirmation from the universe. I have exhausted all the books in my local library on the topic. I just requested Possum Living, which is a reprint of a book published around 30 years ago, written by "Dolly Freed" (took me a while to realize that is a pseudonym).
Why a p-review? I don't know. Perhaps because I read a bit on-line. Also, it sometimes takes a while for the library to order the books I request, especially in the present budget crisis.
The gist is that Dolly and her Dad lived on a biggish piece of rural property 40 miles from Philadelphia. She was (illegally) removed from school and spent her teen years in the library, eventually becoming a NASA engineer. They lived a life of fishing, gardening, swapping, napping, and so on. They lived on around $1400/year.
Now many of us can't be possums. We are locked into high property taxes and other "necessary" expenses. Dolly and her Dad lived a version of extreme frugality. But her point was that she and her Dad looked perfectly middle-class.
Dolly shows that IT CAN BE DONE. How about if you don't want to be a possum? What about a semi-possum life? I think that would be available to many of us.
I started thinking about fun family activities. How about possum weekend? That could consist of eating the food in your pantry, cooking up some soup, going for a walk, whatever. How I wish my children were little; we could have had a lot of fun.
Many of my fave bloggers are already living a semi- or occasional possum life. I wrote about Simple in France a few days ago. And Revanche, a city girl, newly re-employed after a lay-off, and with heavy family responsibilities (financial and emotional), shows that even in expensive California, you can practice frugality by making chicken soup.
Have you read Possum Living? Are you ever a possum?
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