A Basic Standard of Living.

[hunter]

15. Our TV is a movie player. That's all it does. No broadcast, cable, or satellite.

All our telecommunications needs are served by a medium speed DSL connection from a local provider.

There are plenty of "free" homes in the world... it's just that most people can't imagine how to live there.

When my wife and I were young and wild we almost bought a house in a major Midwestern city for one dollar. A big house. One dollar, and we qualified.

We settled on an $8,000 house in a slightly better neighborhood, friendlier to people with babies. We had a baby. The one dollar neighborhood made our parents nervous... I'd be nervous if my own kids were exploring similar places...

All of it was far better than previous young adult unmarried me. Left-behind-Hunter, an off-his-meds homeless guy living in his broken car in a church parking lot, eating Taco Bell scraps. Weirdly, I still love Taco Bell scraps.

Nevertheless, mad Hunter was able to pull himself up by his bootstraps, fix his car, and move up in the world, to the garden shed of a mad PTSD Vietnam War veteran... I learned a lot from him and he got me a job working for one of his mad Vietnam War veteran contractor friends and I've never fallen back, which is just crazy luck.

I feel kinship with those who never experience the crazy luck.

They deserve more.