In jest, I wrote this in the "fishing for coin"
thread, but it has actually been on my mind a fair bit lately. Maybe there are other women (or men) here who want to discuss.
Topic of discussion: how women can figure out how to be involved in the infrastructure portion of permaculture. Because I am a fit, strong woman in her prime and power tools can still take me for a ride, not to mention I don't have the physical strength to be dragging logs around to build structures. When I need something build, I need to pay men. That requires monies. I'm great in the kitchen and the garden, but that limits how far I can take things on my own.
I was not raised with power tools. That does not mean my parents raised me to NOT use them, but neither of them did a lot of projects, so I just wasn't raised in a house where projects were happening regularly. I don't have the basic skill set. I do have an increasing set of tools, but I'm not feeling super comfortable using them. I am pretty darn strong, but they were designed by and for men. They are heavy. Keep in mind, I lift *heavy* weights to stay in shape for my job. I lift 50 pound bags for my horses. I'm not spindly or wimpy. I find most of my power tools fairly heavy for my hands.
I am working with a couple of cedar 8X8s. I tried to move them on my own and could not safely do it. I had a male friend come over. He simply floated it up onto his shoulder and walked off with it. Now, he is a strong, burly dude, but it emphasized the strength disparity between the two of us.
Even if I was good with tools, I don't know how to build things. When I ask male friends for help, they try to be helpful but offer instructions but they have all assumed I know a lot more than I know. For example, I have a friend who is helping me with a project and was giving me instructions on what I could do on my own. I quote, "OK, you need to make a cut here and "da da, da da, da da." Wait, what? What's in the "da da, da da, da da," portion of this project. He listed off the things I would need to know, but there's no way I'd know these things were important on my own! I'm totally willing to get into it and learn. Recently, I learned about mixing and pouring
concrete. I did that just fine. It was easier than baking a cake. Add
water, stir, pour, level. Ok, great.
Jocelyn made some good suggestions about making trades and I do make a point to take care of and
feed the friends that would help me out, but they have their own big projects, too. I am more concerned about doing trades with men I do not know and having them on my property. For example, when I had a new roof put on a
cabin, I woke up one day to find five men in my
yard unannounced. No one told me they were coming. It was sort of a sketchy crew. I am a single woman living alone. Men may not understand that fear, but I think most women will.
Obviously, a great
answer would to be dating someone like-minded with a shared vision and interest in these things. As much as I don't believe in divisions of labor between men and women, there are certain things I just can't do on my own. But, until that next chapter of my life happens and just happened to be with someone interested in these things (not a guarantee), I'm feeling a bit stuck on how to really learn this stuff. There's not too much building I want to do on this current property, but I have much bigger
plans in mind for my next property that I can't even think about embarking on without somehow figuring out how to do this on my own or having a partner to do it with me.
Websites?
Books? Women out there with blogs? I'm open to suggestions.