Introductions

**READ HERE FIRST**
#701

Howdy!

I’m DeAnna. I live on the southern tip of the Puget Sound in Washington state. I teach wilderness skills here in Olympia year-round, and in the summers I work up around Seattle as a wilderness educator. I also make money doing web design and coding. I love the juxtaposition of the two livelihoods, and I especially love weeks where I can do some of both, each providing a break from the other.

I have a dog. He’s pretty cool and way smarter than me.

I also have a partner. He is also pretty cool, but only a little bit smarter than me.

They will both be handy to have around when civilization collapses.

I’m really into fibers of all sorts. I work with wool a lot, but I’m mostly inspired by nettles and cedar as fiber sources. I teach workshops about working with native fibers, and I also run a regular retreat that combines fiber arts with nature awareness skills.

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#702

Hi, my name is Jeff. I’m 26 and from St. Louis, MO. I got into primitivism about a year ago. I’m pretty serious about it and want to learn how to live outside of civilization. It seems like I’m not in a very good spot geographically to learn from those who are like-minded, though.

I read a lot, and have been in college for a long time now. Still no Bachelor’s degree. I’m not in college for degrees, but to learn. I think I’m about at the end of what universities can offer me, though. I’m taking this semester (Spring '11) off to help watch my sister’s kids and then possibly doing an internship at an organic farm. Gotta start the withdrawal from civ somewhere!

#703

Welcome DeAnna and Jeff!

#704

Hey, I like to go by the name Geo. I’m 27, currently living in northern California. I’m originally from eastern Ontario up in Canada.
My childhood was spent in a small Ontario town in a small house across the street from a forest that seemed to me like it went on forever. I was endlessly exploring little niches in the forest and constructing with friends little pit dwellings, treehouses, and our imaginations generally went all over the place. This was when I became really interested in Native Americans (because to my young mind, they could live like we wanted to all the time, without their mums coming to yell at them about having baths).
We moved to the city when I was 12, after my dad passed into the other world. Fortunately, there were a lot of green spaces around where we moved to, including another huge forest, only this one had more people to hide from and spy on from the trees! It was here that we started playing around with making really primitive bows and arrows, and spears, and building more elaborate underground debris shelters, and fighting imaginary wars with other groups of kids in the bush.
Life changes moved me away from such accessible wilderness, and I was sucked into the internet for about 3 years, playing too many hours of computer games and bombing at school.
Ill skip forward a bit. After living in some green spaces on the fringes of the city and generally bumming around a little, I started desiring a little more mobility. I met some people and started doing some fun jobs that didnt really seem like work (bicycle couriering and doing temporary tattoos in a farmer’s market). I managed to save money and then started travelling to Central America during the inhospitable Canadian winters. I met my Californian partner in Guatemala 2 years ago, and after a couple of hectic nomadic seasons crossing borders and getting stressed out over the political boundaries our culture is obsessed with, we recently got married!
I got into reviving my primitive skills at the Buckeye gathering last year here in California, and after some searches online for a more holistic cultural approach to what I realize now is called “Rewilding” I found Jason Godesky’s “Thirty Theses” and Urban Scout’s blog. I’ve been lurking in this forum since last August, hoping for more opportunities to hone my writing and exchanging ideas with like minded folk.
I hope I didn’t go over the top. I can’t wait to ask and answer questions.

#705

Hey everyone! I haven’t spent much time on the internet for quite a while now (over a year & a half - unbelievable, it only feels like its been a few months), but lately I’ve been feeling the urge again - particularly to reconnect with the forum here. So here I am!

Not much has changed for me in the interim, actually (unfortunately). I had hoped to have bought land by now, to begin living more primitively and to work towards building a rewilding community, but it hasn’t happened yet. Major major bummer. It’s looking pretty certain that I will have the money to do so sometime this next summer, but until then, I’m still waiting… and doing what I can while still living a modern lifestyle in a modern house. I have a feeling that the rewilding forum will help a lot to keep me sane, and to keep my spirits up, in the meantime. Not to mention helping me in more tangible ways - connecting with others, fleshing out my plans, and learning many things.

Looking forward to it!
-Jessica

#706

Hey, I’m Calvin Drews. I currently live in northern Michigan.

I have a one way plane ticket to Molokai, an island in the pacific. On august 25, 2011, I’ll be leaving. I plan to try and live in the massive undeveloped rain forest on the east end of the island (or die trying).
So, from now until then, I’m trying to learn everything I can about rewilding, survival skills, and people’s personal experiences.

Thanks for letting me join the forum!
-Calvin

#707

hi everyone , my names kenny. im 30 yrs. old and ive been trying to get back to the land for as long as i can remember. i spent spring , summer , and fall of last year living in the forest in massachusetts. although not very primitively , on rainy days i’d sit in my hut surfing the net on my smart phone :slight_smile: . im spending my winter in the city of brotherly love and im excited that every day is one step closer to getting back to the forest come spring.
i never go on forums or facebook , i have a love/hate thing with computers. but im hoping i can meet other folks in the phily or massachusetts area who are also in to rewilding. especially punks,radical thinkers ,plants lovers , and cave painters

#708

Greetings, critters and crawlers. I’m Cody (although I’d really like to go by a cooler name on this forum–how do I do that?) and I’m a nomadic primitivist, based mainly in Ashland, Oregon, but as of right now in Las Vegas, Nevada (if you are too WHERE ARE YOU). I’m into the holistic/spiritual side of anti-civilization theory and practice, so any questions about the spirit, death, the Tao te Ching, alternative history, or relationships with your spouce / spruce I’d be glad to give my perspective on. Check out ouroborosponderosa.wordpress.com for some zines I’ve made (including an anarchist / pocket friendly version of the I Ching), and newoldtraditions.com for some articles I’ve written. Much love!

#709

Hello, brothers and sisters!

My name is Grusha, im anarcho-primitivist from Moscow. I hope, some of you know me, because I was in Urvision camps (Sweden).

First of all I have to say, that its really nice to be here among like-minded persons. I hope that we’ll get here some good conversations.

So thats my bried story. 6 years ago I became part of militant antifashist movement. Then left wing antifas involved me in anarchism. There was my first Free Forum and someday I realised that anarchism is my way. I started read books, Russia has great anarchist tradition - Bakunin, Kropotkin, Makhno. After three years I was in doubt - everything we were doing was failure. I was hoping for revolution the day after tomorrow, but weve got nothing but arrests, repressions and murders of activists.

I began to seek again. At first it was Ted Kaczynski book and finally - fresh translated book of John Zerzan “Future Primitiv”. I was like a hungry boy in Macdonalds. That was awesome! Suddenly everything in the world fall into place! I established small anarcho-primitivist community with my comrade in Moscow and few web-sites. Now every anarchist in Russia have heard about anarcho-primitivism and thats awesome too.

I visited Urvision camps and meet there good people, like Thierry Sallantin. Years pasted, I finished university and became “free man”. So… Mom, should I get a job? But… I FUCKING HATE to work!

Now Im looking for possibilities to join real anarcho-primitivist commune and live there. At first I was thinking about Tamarack song’s offer to learn primitive skills for one year for $5000, but its too much. Thierry Sallantin has good plan to get aside from civilisation, but I lost him - he dosnt answer me.

So Im here, brothers and sisters, to kick asses and chew bubble-gum and I’m all out of bubblegum.

#710

GRUSHA!!! how are you !!!

you werent there last time. I hope to get to hang out with you again some day !
great to see you here!! i did get to meet your friend again it was really great ! if you see them, tell them the dutch guy said hi!

simon from the netherlands

ps. sorry for throwing sand in your eyes during the workshop. it was either us or them. 8) haha

#711

Welcome all you new folks!!!

Re: name changes
I can change your name on an administrative level. Please just message me the name you would like. I am insanely busy and it takes me a while to get to this stuff so please be patient with your legal civ names as I get my shit together. Thanks for understanding.

#712

Today Scout reminded me that I’m a moderator here, so I’m returning. Yay! Okay, I’ve just been lazy lately and neglected some thing, but I’ll make it up, I promise. And I figured I’d re-introduce myself for all the new members, particularly those who’ve joined since our switch back to the old forum style.

My name is Dan (duh), and I’m the primary organizer for Rewild New England (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rewildnewengland/). I live in Central MA, and my usual haunts are in northern RI and central MA, though I regularly drive to other parts of New England. I teach wilderness skills part time at Great Hollow Wilderness School, and will also be starting at Two Coyotes Wilderness School in a few weeks. I round that off with part time security work. If you’re in the area, I’d be happy to meet you! I’m also a blogger (http://29000acorns.blogspot.com), which is something else I ignored for a while. My main goals lately have been finding ways to combine mainstream prepping/survivalism with primitive/earth skills to find useful ways to bridge the gap between civilized and hunter-gatherer lifeways.

#713

Hey Dan! I’m glad that you’ve returned, and look forward to future conversations. I’m also excited to see so many new “faces” :wink: - hello! Everyone, please feel free to post away, since not much happens here if people don’t post (as I’m reminding myself). 'd enjoy hearing fresh perspectives, and getting to know y’all better!

Jessica

#714

Hi Everyone!

I am so glad to be here. :smiley:

I live in the unglaciated area of the Midwest called the Driftless Area and within easy walking distance of the confluence of the Wisconsin and Mississippi Rivers. We have a ton of public land next door, state and federally owned - big enough that you could get lost if there wasn’t a huge river system in the middle of it. Extremely diverse flora, fauna, and topography.

My husband and I have a pretty good start on understanding our bioregion. I know a lot of edible plants and have been foraging my whole adult life but need to challenge myself more with medicinals.

I’m a rural girl (now, spent my first 18 years in a city) and my husband and I have a small business restoring/maintaining natural areas. We also are meat goat farmers. The goats mostly help us manage vegetation but some of them are food.

I’ve been interested in making our business more of a Dan-Quinn-tribal-business but the culture here is very close-minded. Lately I’ve been thinking that our business could be a tool to form the core of a tribe (begin the transition from civ to HG or at least form some liveable hybrid until the collapse). I definitely crave the close contact with women and children that I am missing by not living in a tribe.

I’m especially interested in finding others who love the Driftless area as much as we do and want to make it their landbase.

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#715

Hey Jaye!

Welcome to the forum!

And feel free to post in old topics. :wink:

#716

Hello! I am a post-civilization anarchist in Cascadia, pretty new to rewilding but definitely willing to learn. On the theoretical level, I’m pretty eclectic, taking ideas from Derrick Jensen, Ran Prieur, Lao Tzu and the situationists, to name a few. On the practical level, I’ve lately been exploring the local area and attuning myself to the various rhythms, impressions and chance events around me.

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#717

Hey, I’m StarGazer from Southern Oregon. I’m a post-left anarchist, survivalist, development critic, primitivist, and radical environmentalist. I’m also an amateur naturalist,botanist,and mycologist. I despise modern civilization and love primitive bushcraft. I write various texts ranging from primitive wilderness spirituality to bushcraft.

#718

Welcome Starg@zer and all the others whose introduction i’ve missed !

i’m not much online anymore but its good to see people finding this place and using it. Nice to (virtually) meet you.

take care

#719

hi everyone,
I found the forum a long time ago, but didn’t have a deep look until a month ago. And after reading the 30 theses (and still curious to read all of the Anthropik texts) here I am. So, a bit of my story…
I was grown in a very small village surrounded by an young oak forest, but since very small my father did a good job developing in us a fear for everything living in the forest. He is this kind of guy who grew up working in agriculture and farming and wants something “better” for his kids, away from the “shame” of working so hard to get a meal. I could have been taught primitive traps at the age of 5, but still now it is difficult to pull this kind of information out of his mouth. I remember as a small child i was much more aware than now. Since very small i felt quite outraged by the complexity of every aspect of the modern society and realized that the more comfortably we live, the more we damage the mother Earth.
In order to fit among the other kids in school, i became quite civilized and started focusing in studying in order to get a “good” life: so i started university. Then i realized that even studying hard and getting a good job, i would share most of my time with my coworkers and not with my beloved ones, so, what’s the point?
Browsing in some anarchist forums I found the term “primitivism” and started to read texts by John Zerzan, Theodore John Kaczynski, Miguel Amorós … and found out that what i was reading was not sheer madness, but quite similar to what i used to have in mind when child. Then i quited university and started to make research about primitive skills, bushcraft, and the ways everything was done before this nasty industrial times.
By this time i was living and working in a big city and started to think about how i could help fighting against the industrial system and learn how to live completely out of it at the same time. I went to the first Urvision, and after attending to most of the workshops (after taking part in one i was asking the people holding the others and taking notes about everything) and hearing all different of stories, i became fully aware that living out of the grid is feasible but learning it could take a life long, so fighting the system at the same time would be at least tricky.
So I focused on learning as much as possible, but still living in the city and knowing nobody close interested in the same things,… it was quite complicated to practice some things. I continued going to the Urvision gathering the next years, but focused too much on learning practical stuff and not enough on meeting people (dont ask where this stupid behavior comes from) and spent winters working and doing more research.
I got to know about some primitive camp in Scandinavia and spent some months there, only to make it even more clear for myself that anything inside of the industrial system, or known and allowed by it is just a plain lie.
I’ve been voluntarily unemployed for more than 2 years and now i am focused on practicing primitive skills, and would like to find the way to be part of a tribe living completely out of the civilization. Sometimes i participate on some primitive skills/bushcraft/survival forums, but they feel too focused on practical stuff but nothing on getting people together.

Thanks for letting me join the comunity!

Incomplete.

#720

Hello incomplete !

Nice to meet you. We might’ve met on some of the Urvision Gatherings ( i was there at the last two).
Good to have you join us on the forums.

Take care