Simple Living on the Road

Last week, my grandmother, Bettina S. Cottrell, died, not unexpectedly. She was 95 and lived in the house her parents lived in, which her grandmother had built back in the 19th century. In fact, when I look at a map of the Boston area and a map of place names from my family tree, it’s pretty clear that most of “the family” (both sides) did not travel more than a few miles from their birthplaces.

It’s a phenomenon common on the East Coast, less so on the West Coast. I suppose that’s due to the Western states having been settled by people who were willing to move away from home, willing to get past their past, and so forth. The American West was a land of opportunity, freedom, escape. Wide open spaces. Spaces between you and your neighbor.

But here, within a few miles of Norwood– a day’s ride by horseback, perhaps, entire lives were lived by my ancestors. People were born, courted, married, had children, went to war, survived their spouses, died, and were buried, all within a 28 mile area around themselves and their relatives. If they were bored, they found something to do– an industry, or a pastime to occupy them. If they were lonely, they became involved in their community. If they were poor or ailing, they sought help from their neighbors, their church. They knew without needing a book or SEO website that the connections we make with other humans are the keys to happiness, physical health, and financial success.

Grandma volunteered with many organizations in her life, headed up environmental protection organizations before the EPA even existed. She traveled widely– in her last few years, she went to both Alaska and Iceland, and she never stopped learning and reading and being engaged in her world and her community. She was a pioneer in spirit and in fact, and I have a lot of admiration for the things she did, the paths she traveled.

While we’re on the road, engagement with a community is one aspect of life we miss out on, and one I do miss. From both parents, I’ve inherited a strong sense of volunteerism, and it’s hard to pack up and move on without finding ways to give back to the places we go. As citizens of the world, I believe it behooves us to find ways to return to the world some part of what, by our simple existence, we take from it, and I suppose since the online community is where we can build those connections, that’s where we have the greatest agency for giving back, for return. And when, in the course of our travels, we have found and taken the opportunities to return to the world its bounty, we have ourselves been enriched. Emotionally, spiritually, and socially.

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