Future Organic Homesteaders, Donating Possessions to Charity and Vermont Bound

There is a new trend emerging among young American families, that people are coining, 'The Simplicity Movement'. The NYTimes recently did a feature story on a few of these families who are donating their possessions, and hitting the road towards creating a simpler story for themselves and their loved ones.

from the NYTimes:::::
“It’s amazing the amount of things a family can acquire,” said Mrs. Harris, 28, attributing their good life to “the ridiculous amount of money” her husband earned as a computer network engineer in this early Wi-Fi mecca.

The Harrises now hope to end up as organic homesteaders in Vermont.

“We’re not attached to any outcome,” said Mrs. Harris. They are not alone.

Cindy Wallach and her husband, Doug Vibbert, of Annapolis, Md., moved out of their apartment with an “everything must go” party and, along with their 3-year-old son, now sail and make their home on a 44-by-24-foot catamaran. “We never wanted four walls and beige carpet,” Ms. Wallach said.

Indeed, though it may not be the stuff of the typical American dream, the modern simplicity movement, which traces its inception to 1980s Seattle, is drawing a great deal of renewed interest, some experts say.

“If you think about some of the shifts we’re having economically — shifts in oil and energy — it may be the right time,” said Mary E. Grigsby, associate professor of rural sociology at the University of Missouri and the author of “Buying Time and Getting By: The Voluntary Simplicity Movement.”

“The idea in the movement was ‘everything you own owns you,’ ” said Dr. Grigsby, who sees roots of the philosophy in the lives of the Puritans. “You have to care for it, store it. It becomes an appendage, I think. If it enhances your life and helps you do the things you want to do, great. If you are burdened by these things and they become the center of what you have to do to live, is that really positive?”