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Among the things I learned about Salida when I read
about its most recent discovery in the August edition of
Outside magazine is that this place is almost off the
grid.
Off the grid
is a phrase that appears frequently
these days, almost always with a positive connotation, and
I've seen two definitions. In both, grid
comes from
gridiron,
which is a framework of metal bars used
for cooking over an open fire, like the grill of a hibachi
pot.
If you look at a football field, freshly chalked before
the game, you see the same pattern, which explains why the
field is sometimes called a gridiron
and the players
gridders.
But off the grid
has nothing to do with football.
One definition starts with the fact that our power
generation and distribution systems are connected to form
the electric grid.
Thus this definition from
Wordspy.com, a website devoted to new words and phrases:
Off the grid: Relating to a person, family, dwelling, or
community that no longer requires connections to utilities,
especially the electricity and water supplies and the
sewage system. Also: off-the-grid, off grid,
off-grid.
The earliest citation there is 1991, but the concept is certainly older. That's how one of my grandfathers lived, up until he died in 1965, on his two-section homestead 17 miles northeast of Bill, Wyo., which had the closest paved road, electric line and telephone.
But even if he wasn't on an electric grid, he still had light from Coleman lanterns, which burned white gas, which came from somewhere else via an intricate system of wells, pumps, pipes, refineries and distributors. He heated with coal that he had to get somewhere. He ate some of the beef he raised, but he also bought canned vegetables and milk somewhere. He needed propane for his refrigerator and batteries for his radio.
In that respect, he wasn't that different from people I
know now who say they're off the grid,
but actually
connect to a different kind of grid -- one that supplies
chain-saw gasoline, clothes, vegetables and lead-acid
storage batteries. Even the mountain men of yore gathered
at an annual rendezvous so they could acquire steel traps
and bullet lead. They weren't exactly off the grid
either.
So I don't know that off the grid
really means
much in the utility context. Even if you don't have an
electric bill every month, you're still connected to big
systems of production and distribution.
I've seen one other definition. It refers to the grid on
maps, especially the co-ordinates on military maps.
Something that is off the grid
is off the map --
presumably unknown to the authorities.
Given the current attitude of many authorities, ranging
from their perverse interest in our reading habits to their
twisted desire to imprison folks who grow the wrong plants
in their gardens, an off the grid
habitation sounds
rather appealing.
But is there really such a place? This nation got a grid even before it adopted the Constitution in 1787. There was a congress under the Articles of Confederation, and in 1784 a Virginia delegate proposed, and got, a rectangular surveying system derived from the fashionable French rationalism of the time.
There's a direct intellectual line from Rene Descartes
(inventor of the Cartesian co-ordinates known to every
first-year algebra students) to that Virginia delegate, a
fellow named Thomas Jefferson, and from there to townships
and section-line roads, and indeed our residence in one
of those big square states out west.
It seems paradoxical that Jefferson, that great apostle of liberty, brought us the grid which is now perceived, at least by some, as an instrument of authoritarianism and as something to be avoided by sensible people.
But in Colorado and Wyoming anyway, we're not just on
the grid,
we're in the grid.
We can't avoid it
any more than those folks who make their own electricity
can avoid buying copper wire and ammeters.
Getting off the grid
can be an appealing concept,
but the more you consider it, the less it really means. As
for Salida being almost off the grid,
perhaps it
relates to the occasional variability of our electricity
supply -- so I'd best finish this before the usual
afternoon thunderstorm brings lightning bolts to a grid
that might reach my keyboard.
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