This morning, like every morning, I walked out into the teeth of the weather in my pajamas. We, like generations of Americans before ours, have a "Little House," an outhouse. While for most contemporary Americans such a thing is unthinkable, for us it's a connection with our environment in a very real way. Looking out the window to see what the day is bringing you can't hold a candle to getting out into it half-dressed to feel what it's bringing you!

What I felt yesterday morning was a Hunker Down Day.

Here's the deal: every day we ask ourselves, "what will (or did) I do today that will sustain this lifestyle?" It's an important question. We are surviving largely on our savings from the sale of our previous home, and a few other resources. We have several moneymaking projects, most what we call "micro-incomes," small streams of money that require little more than maintenance on our part. This would be a stock portfolio, were that still the smart option it used to be. Most of our time and energy focuses on keeping us clothed, fed, sheltered, and warm. So, what did I do today? Did I gather firewood? Did I catch a fish? Did I work in the garden? It's important to move ahead, not to get complacent and fall behind.

Then there are days like today. The wind is somewhere around 30 knots and it's raining heavily. These are fairly common conditions in Southeast Alaska, even in our area, where it's a bit drier than the rest of the region. On a day like today it's not difficult to get outside, but it's the kind of day when you look for indoor projects, where one can perhaps sit down, enjoy a cup of coffee or hot cocoa. A job like updating the blog perhaps . . . .

But there are days that are best declared Hunker Down Days, although we've learned to be very cautious about such declarations. Just like the government's ridiculous color-coded threat assessments, such a declaration can quickly get out of hand.

The first winter we spent on the homestead was a pretty tough one. It was the harshest winter any of the local town's old timers could remember—and our old timers have a lot of winters behind them! The schools in the region closed for an unusual amount of time. Irresistibly drawn to the allure of an honest-to-goodness snow day, even at our age, Gardener and I were quick to decide that if her public school peers weren't studying, Apprentice (who is home schooled) didn't have to study either. She, and we, would observe these snow days in solidarity with the townsfolk. With several feet of snow in the dooryard, freezing spray dashing in from the wave-torn rocks, and the wind howling above 30 knots, it was a Hunker Down Day if any deserved the term.

So we snuggled down in front of the woodstove, hot drinks at our elbow, to read or play games, or perhaps write letters.

Then a funny thing happened. Of course, we couldn't tear our eyes from the windows. The storm was more exciting, and more comprehensively plotted than most television shows. Soon Gardener noticed the weirdly-shaped hollows the wind had carved around every unmovable object. Our curiosity grew, and soon we were bundled up and outside strapping on our snowshoes. We had to climb the trail up the ridge behind us, the trail that leads eventually to the bay, and then to the road and town.

What we saw there is hard to describe. Imagine, if you will, a steep wooded slope, over which tons and tons of refined white sugar, or perhaps foam, had been poured. Then, in mid flow, it suddenly stopped still. That is what we saw in the woods, where the wind, baffled by cliff faces and slopes, swirled through the forest, sculpting the snow. It was breathtaking! We decided that since we were out, we should hike as much of the trail as we felt like, breaking the new snow to preserve the track. We'd already seen what could happen: one night Gardener hiked out for a community meeting. She was gone only two hours at most, but when she returned, the piling and blowing snow had erased all trace of the trail. Luckily, she was by then familiar enough with the way to make it home, but we learned the wisdom of repacking the trail now and then.

Snowshoeing is a pretty good workout, and by the time we turned back toward home, we'd covered more than three-quarters of the trail, and arrived home hot, winded, and flushed. So much for hunkering down. True, we weren't really working, but we were accomplishing something, and, if viewed as recreation, it was a lot more strenuous than working on a puzzle or shuffling a deck of cards.

This was one example. What I've observed is that a declared Hunker Down Day almost always guarantees more work will be accomplished that day than on a "regular" day on the homestead. Either the weather improves unexpectedly (which often happens) or a restlessness sets in, or our attitude changes after a couple of hours of rest and relaxation. Perhaps more significantly, I suspect that by giving ourselves permission to take it easy for a day, we remove the pressure to be out and doing, and focus switches from the obligation to achieve to the pleasure of achieving.

Because here's an important lesson that I've learned. Actually, I think I've always known it, as I was raised this way, but I've proved the lesson time and time again living on the homestead: not all work is work. Working for the good of one's family, on projects that make a better life for yourself and the ones you love is not the same as working for wages. Yes, the ends are the same—working a "real" job earns the money to spend on the family's needs, so the effect is much the same. But, having worked most of my life at a strange variety of jobs, none can compare to the satisfaction of the work I do now. Working at making a living for yourself and your family is more than work, it's prayer, or meditation, maybe even recreation in the truest sense of that word. It's much more physically challenging than the office jobs I used to have, but at the end of a day on the homestead, I think I'm less tired than I ever was after a calm day at the office. Maybe the tiredness I'm talking about is spiritual, not physical.

There are two important differences I see between these two types of work. First, our kind of work is self-scheduled. We work our own hours, at our own pace. If something more important (or even just more fun) presents itself, we switch to that. Or, we knock off for awhile, to watch a whale go by, or to bird watch, or to snack. Secondly, we do it as a family. This is not to say that all of our projects are worked on together. Most are not. But we have access to each other. If Apprentice has a question for me, she knows where to find me. She doesn't have to call the office, and have a receptionist or the voicemail tell her that Dad's busy and can't take her call. If Gardener finds yet another large rock in the new garden plot, she can summon me to help pull it out. And, if a neighbor drops by to visit, we can stop what we're doing and sit down to chat over a cup of tea. These are the things that makes work a pleasure, rather than . . . well, a job.

But another lesson I've learned is that while it is important to move ahead, to make progress on ensuring our continued existence here on the homestead, the whole thing won't come tumbling down if, every now and then, we do hunker down. That is going to prove one of the most important lessons learned here. We do have to keep our eyes on the prize as it were, but we don't need to create stress over it. To do so would be to jeopardize the whole plan. Little by little, things get done.

This is a hard lesson for me. As "head of the family" (and I do use that term advisedly) I feel a responsibility to ensure our survival. But I am beginning to see that my perception of what should happen, and when, is not the best plan. For instance, accumulating firewood seems like a no-brainer: obviously, the woodshed must be filled with enough wood by mid-autumn to see us through the winter. But in reality, this may not be the best, safest course. While the vision of a huge pile of wood, dried, seasoned, neatly stacked stored up against the ravages of the coming winter is overpoweringly seductive, it is far more sensible to focus my energies elsewhere, and accumulate that supply of wood more slowly. It doesn't make sense to be up in the woods on a warm day, sweating and bug-bitten as I buck up a fallen tree, when the salmon are running off the rocks. They won't be there a month or two from now. The tree will be. And a month or two from now, the bugs will be gone, the days will be cooler to the point where a good vigorous workout with a saw would be welcome. There may even be snow on which to sled the rounds down to the cabin for chopping. So, if I reject the ideal I've conjured for myself and attend to each task in its proper season, I lessen the work and discomfort of one job, and avoid missing the window of the other.

So, the Hunker Down Day is there for us when we need it, but, like most treats, it must be doled out carefully. You never know what might come of it.