Shantyboating Shapes Life at Payne Hollow: Lent 3, 2012

Jesus overturns the temple in this weeks lesson from John 2:13-22. Where are our expectations "turned over" to offer us a chance of freedom? What are we holding onto that might get in our way of living a more full life?
Harlan and Anna Hubbard upon getting married built a shantyboat to float down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. They then spent forty years living on the fringe of society on a Homestead on the Ohio River, Kentucky: Payne Hollow. That experience of turning their back - or at least living in tension - with the demands of the world versus the demands of the earth is reflected in this quote below.
I have found that our living upon our sailboat has shaped how we now see the world, too. What shapes how you see the world?

Blessed Be

Joel

     Once, when Bill [Shadrick] was beached out at Big Six, he accepted a ride into town from a friend of ours. Noting that he was a stranger, Bill asked him what had brought him to these parts. Upon learning that he had been visiting Harlan Hubbard in Payne Hollow, Bill considered a moment, then put another question: "Is he a real riverman?"
     This puzzled our friend, but we can see Bill's point. He himself was indeed a real riverman, born on a shantyboat and as much a part of the river as the catfish and driftwood. On the other hand, we had come to the river by choice and to his sensitive eye some remnants of our former town environment still clung to us. He regarded us as amateurs.
     Yet it could be asserted that we are closer to the river than Bill ever was. An undeniable love for the river drew us away from town and down to the shore; the boat we built there was to carry us into a new existence. This regeneration gave a direction to our lives that Anna had never before contemplated; for me it was the fulfillment of old longings; yet we were both led on by a common desire to get down to earth and to express ourselves by creating a setting for our life together which would be in harmony with the landscape.
     Thus our conception of shantyboating - for we still regard ourselves as shantyboaters even though our home is a house on shore instead of a boat - is quite different from Bill Shadrick's. It goes deeper than his, and rests on firmer ground. We live with a tautness which results in pressures and tensions from the outside world that Bill never experienced in his easygoing way. Our house, like our boat, is always in order, well arranged and clean as a pin. We cannot sit in idleness for very long at a time, letting life drift along as it will. To buy bread and coffee, beans and bacon from the store and pay for such inferior provender by catching and selling fish does not appeal to us at all. We catch fish for our own eating, get all our living as direct means as possible, that we may be self-sufficient and avoid contributing to the ruthless mechanical system that is destroying the earth.
     In this endeavor, no sacrifice is called for, no struggle or effort of will. Such a way is natural. Rather than hardship, it brings peace and inner rewards beyond measure.
     Thus shantyboating has become, for us, a point of view, a way of looking at the world and at life. You take neither of them too seriously, nor do you try to understand their complexities. Who can? It is an obviously illogical philosophy, in which the individual is supreme. The claims made on him by his inner beliefs are above the demands of society. He is not without compassion, but his love is expended on those of his fellow men he is in contact with. With no schemes for universal betterment, he tends his own garden.
     Is this selfish? No. The selfish man wants more than his share, a higher seat at the table than he is entitled to. One strong enough to stand by himself is not attracted by the prizes which the world offers. He has his own values, receives other rewards, for which there is no competition.
     Instead of trying to make everyone alike, the state and society should encourage individualism. Individuals will never be too numerous; in fact, they are becoming harder to find. The river shantyboater has passed away, along with the old river; yet a few renegades will always be found, out in the brush somewhere, or on a forgotten bit of river shore, content with an environment the proud would scorn. The shantyboat strain is not likely to be cultivated out of existence, any more than the earth will ever be completely subdued.
~ Harlan Hubbard. Payne Hollow: Life on the Fringe of Society. (Gnomon Press, 1974, 1997), 161-163.