Ep. 132: Homesteading with Mark Bonnalie

Everyday, hunters and sportsmen look at moving to the country and building a sustainable simple life. Dirk talks with long time friend Mark Bonnalie, aka "Modern Rural Civilian," about his origin story and the inspiration to sell everything and move to rural acreage and begin building their homestead.

Connect with Jason, Dirk, and Phelps Game Calls

MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and Youtube Clips

Subscribe to The MeatEater Podcast Network on YouTube

Shop Phelps Merch

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:11):
Welcome back to another episode of Cutting the Distance podcast.
I'm Dirk Durham and today on this episode, I have
an old friend and colleague, Mark Binelli. He is considered
or known as AKA the modern rural civilian. Welcome to show. Mark.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Thank you so much, Dirk. I appreciate you having it's
good to chat with you. It's been a while.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
Yeah, it's been a while. I first met Mark years ago.
I think it was twenty ten on my first day
when I changed careers and went to work at night
Force Objects and you know, always starting a new job,
you always have these insecurities and unsettling feelings and what
the day may bring or if you like anybody there

(00:57):
or anything. And I met Mark, and immediately Mark introduced
himself and you want to know all about me? Where
are you from, what do you do, what are you into,
what do you do for fun? What about your family?
And throughout the day you introduced yourself or you introduced
me to everyone that came through our our work area, like, hey,

(01:17):
hey have you met Derek? You know blahlah blah, you
know you know you like you. You made me feel
at home and and welcome to such a degree at
the end of the day, I went home thinking, man,
I've made the right decision. I'm in a good place here,
and I've always appreciated that.

Speaker 2 (01:35):
Thank you, Derek. I uh, it's been so long ago.
I you know, those days were I was, I was
really enjoying myself at night for back in the early days,
and and to get new faces, and and I know
that you had kind of come to us from a
sort of a long, a long career in the in

(01:56):
the tire industry, and changing changing jobs isn't easy. So
I like, you know, all the new folks around there,
especially if they had ties to the local area, I thought, uh,
you know, it's pretty cool to try to welcome them
with the with the most open arms that a guy
could offer.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
Yeah, well it worked. It worked, and it also impressed
upon me the amount of effort that you'd done that
to where anytime anybody knew was hired, whenever I met them,
I tried to extend them the same curtesy and just
like welcome and you know, show them the same hospitality
you showed me. So it was. It was contagious.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
That's awesome. I love the pay it forward mentality, and
and it sounds like it worked back then. That's really
cool to hear, especially from from this many years down
the road. Derek, that's cool.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, yeah. Back then we talked about hunting
and fishing and cooking and past careers and and not
to mention all the humorous jokes and stories share the
true there. Man, we had a lot of good time.
I felt like we had a good a good working
job there.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
I really loved it. I actually there's there's a lot
of times I miss, you know, the hanging out with
the guys and and all the stories and the humor
that we got to share. And uh, you know, nowadays
life is is gratifying in other creative ways, but you know,

(03:24):
you just it's hard to replace that, uh, that camaraderie
that you have around the around the workplace that you know,
it's it's not a part of my my daily routine
or life anymore. But man, we had some good times.

Speaker 1 (03:39):
Yeah yeah, well it hadn't met. You know, anytime you
meet people of a certain mindset or attitude or or demeanor,
or whether they treat other paid people, it makes you wonder, like,
what kind of a family were they? Did they grow
up in? What kind of a community were they raised
in and tell us tell the folks about, you know,

(04:00):
your family and the community you were raised in.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, so, man, my my family, my mom and dad
are you know, they're there. I suppose you might call
them a rarity these days. They're they're still married. They've
been married, you know, since there their early twenties, and
they both gosh, they both graduated high school in in

(04:25):
uh my hometown of Orfino, Idaho, and never you know,
never left. They they my dad's been a longer his
whole life and worked in the woods for you know,
he's now semi retired. But just my parents have always
been you know, they were kind of they were kind

(04:45):
of at a younger age. For I suppose a lot
of my a lot of my friends's parents. And I
can't tell you how often growing up I would get
the comment from my older friends, they're, man, your parents
are so cool. You really need to appreciate your parents.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
You know.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
They were always reminding me how how lucky I was
to have such down to earth and and uh, just
just good, good people. So you know, my my, my mom,
she's been in the nursing and uh, you know, emergency
room nursing field. Her whole life. And uh they they

(05:25):
both grew up not far from from where they still
live right now, you know, in the in the uh
clear Water Valley country, and uh yeah, just just amazing people.
I'm super blessed to call them my folks. I'm sure
like a lot of us out there were just uh
I always I always feel like, if you know, I've

(05:46):
got big shoes to fill with with both of the
parents that I was raised by, and and for a
long time, I'll be honest, I I made uh bast
afterwards decisions in order to try to fill those shoes.
It's taken me quite some time to hit my high
note and really feel like I'm beginning to put a

(06:10):
dent in filling their big shoes. So still still hang
out with them often, you know, I go down and
visit them and or you know, usually every other weekend.
Just incredible, incredible family. I have one younger sister, she's
three years younger than I am. And yeah, just you know,

(06:34):
upbringing was I'm always giving credit back to the you know,
we weren't completely like a farm family or anything. We
just lived you know, out of town. And my dad,
I feel like my dad was never wealthy enough and
always capable enough to be able to to to have

(06:58):
to choose to fix stuff itself or or or accomplish
his goals, you know, mostly with his own two hands.
And he always was trying to teach me, you know,
to pay attention and to learn this or that, And
looking back, I wish I would have paid attention to
a lot more. But now with the way I get

(07:20):
to approach problem solving on my property and and trying
to fix everything in my life, you know, mechanically and creatively,
I owe a lot to that upbringing of In one way,
I think it's stemmed from not being able to afford
to just call somebody and hire, you know, hire the

(07:41):
job to be fixed or done. But in a big way,
I think a lot of my successes in my in
my current life come from the approach that my dad
took to so many of his challenges in life and
projects in life. So lots of lots of outdoors man,

(08:04):
you know, I started chasing my dad around in the
woods back before actually, you know, I think back in
those days we could only get our hunting license at
the age of twelve, and I definitely can remember, you know,
hiking around with him in the woods for numerous years
before I was actually able to carry my own rifle.

(08:25):
So those are probably some of the best, you know,
some of the best childhood memories that we shared together.
We we, uh, we spent a lot of time in
the woods together. My uncle as well. He was kind
of a big driving force in the in the get
my dad to become addicted to elk hunting and elk

(08:47):
camp and anyway, just looking back, I'm super grateful for
all those lessons I got to learn through through hands
on experience. And and I think sometimes folks think that
I had a lot much you know, a more a
more rural you know, maybe like a farm life upbringing

(09:09):
or something like that. But uh, it was just small
town Idahope, you know, as far as I could look
back and explain, very grateful for that childhood girl.

Speaker 1 (09:18):
Yeah, I love the level of respect you have for
your folks. And man, it seems like today in society
we see more and more people, you know that look
down on boomers whatever they want to call this older generation.
But right that you appreciate the level of respect you
have for your folks. And I've Helarad you talked about,
you know, your dad's lifelong friends and stuff like that.

(09:41):
Just you know, it's it's it's neat to see that.
Now we're going to dig in here in a little
bit about what modern rural civilian is all about. But
I still want to. I want to still dig in
on like like the what what got you to that point?
And before before you you kind of fell into that
that role. Yeah, But one thing I always noticed about

(10:05):
you at Nightforce and then since we we've both left
that place and moved on, is no matter what it
seemed like, no matter what kind of hobby or activity
you've ever done, you always you just went all in.
And I can remember our all some of our long
talks we used to have about long range shooting. You know,

(10:25):
you were just like a sponge on long range shooting.
You'd go home and you'd study, and you would study
manuals on scopes, and you would you were picking everybody's
brain that you possibly could. You were, you know, you
were bugging anybody that anybody that would that would listen
or give you the time of day about long rain shooting,
which then you repeated and to me and everyone else

(10:49):
that would listen. And I always love that, so a
lot of my knowledge that I know from about long
rain shooting comes from your diatribes that you used to
They go down, but I loved it. But I remember
one cool memory. Uh, let you know, because this is
phenomenally a hunting podcast, I want to talk a little

(11:10):
bit about hunting. I remember tell us about long range
mountain lion hunting that had some crazy times in the
woods with that.

Speaker 2 (11:22):
It's, uh, looking back, I think about those memories a
lot these days, and I it's it's hard to imagine
that it was the reality of that of that time
frame in life. But probably the best way I can
summarize what what we stumbled into as far as the

(11:43):
mountain lion hunting and and uh, we had there sort
of a honey hole that wasn't too awfully far out
from one of my relatives' properties on public public land.
And you know, early on from the very the very
first time that we had any interaction with the mountain
lion was was just hearing this this loud bird type chirping,

(12:07):
you know, down in the bottom of the canyon. We
we would go out there late season just as much
to long range shoot and and practice as it was
to possibly take advantage of of any animals that would
be in season late, you know, late in the year.
This was all uh, you know, I would it's been

(12:29):
so long ago, but I would say, you know, after
the first of the year up and through up into
the March type months, you know, most guys have left
the woods for the year, you know. And and once again,
like I said, we were just out there to mainly
practice shooting, stay consistent with our long distance shooting. And

(12:51):
as we're as we're out there with our with all
of our equipment and enjoying life, we begin to hear
this this uh you know, you've probab probably heard it yourself,
and I'm sure there's lots of guys on the podcasts
that have. But it turns out it was a female's
mating call, which sounds a lot like a like a

(13:11):
loud chirping of a bird. And I don't recall how often,
you know, we would go out to this spot every weekend,
you know, probably two three days every weekend. And from
from the very first time that we heard the the
vocalizations and we wound up, this went on for years.

(13:34):
I mean, like I said, the the lack of hearing
this story anywhere else in life makes me just so
giddy about the opportunities and the neatness of how this
all played out. But to summarize it best I can,
and I got obsessed, just like I do with everything

(13:56):
about studying mountain lions and their behavior and their habitat
and their you know, their habits. But this female mountain
lion kind of broke the mold in a sense that
she seemed to be very centrally located in this in
this small little two mile square you know of Idaho woods,

(14:19):
and and she didn't travel very far out of here.
But we wound up, of course seeing the female that
first year. And we would always joke because we were
either you know, we were either riding snowmobiles or four
wheelers out from you know, from the closest relativest property

(14:41):
there that we would access this place from. And you know,
to tell your family you're going out mountain lion hunting
without without dogs is kind of a laughing a laughing
stock of a joke, even hooking back. But yeah, so
it all started out with just the vocalizations. Uh. Eventually

(15:04):
it turned into you know, we would spot this lion
across the canyon. Uh, I don't communicate a whole lot
with the friend that at that time that I was
doing all of the all of the adventure and with
and and Back in those days, video you know, video
equipment was a lot less fancy than than it is now.

(15:24):
So we were, uh out there somewhere on earth this
video of all of all of a lot of these interactions,
but just on like a little handicam you know, I
don't I often dream and somehow I could wind up
with the memory card out of that thing, because uh,
there was there was one spring that we watched this

(15:46):
same you know, the same female, uh with three different cubs,
you know, just sung yourself in a beautiful grassy green
spot on the other side of the canyon. Probably I
don't remember for sure, but I would say six to
eight hundred yards away. These cubs are just jumping all
over her, attacking her, wrestling her, you know, just like

(16:09):
a look like a house cat with kittens, but just
some of the neatest life experiences when it comes to
being out in the woods that you could ever you know,
that you could ever bring home stories to mom and
dad or stories to your friends. Especially at that time
I was working at night Force and you know, looking
back and how rare that opportunity was, I'm sure half

(16:30):
those guys probably thought I was just uh making making,
making this stuff up. But it was one of the neatest,
probably the neatest, you know, woods stuff I've ever experienced.
Uh I wound up spotting, you know, I think it was. Uh,

(16:51):
my family's always been into dirt bikes and dirt bike
racing and stuff. And I remember specifically that the day
that I shot my male lion from that same spot
on Earth that we viewed and you know, witnessed all
this neat stuff at about it was four hundred and
eighty something yards across the canyon, this lion, you know,

(17:13):
the fog was was down really low in the canyon,
and you know, we always kind of just played our
cards to see if the fog was going to lift
to where we could actually see get a good view
of the opposing canyon wall. And as the fog began
to lift, here is a dead white tail and a
lion that's feeding on it. You know, that's that's that's

(17:37):
eating his morning breakfast off of this little buck that
he had killed in the in the prior week or whatever.
And that was the very first time that I think, well,
that was the first time I ever got a you know,
laid behind my rifle with a with a mountain lion
in the scope. It was a pretty surreal scenario. But

(18:00):
I do remember that it was the opening day of
either Supercross or the outdoor series. I don't recall because
I called my dad. I called my dad immediately after
I after I shot it, and uh, and I remember
he was, yeah, he was. He was watching in the
opener of the of the dirt bike season, whichever whichever

(18:21):
race series it was. But unbelievable, Like I said, four,
I think it was, you know, it was at that
time that was a pretty shoot lower. And shooting is
such a uh what do you want to call it.
It's such a it's such a perishable skill. If you're
not doing it frequently and doing it often, you shouldn't
be doing it at all, and and especially with an animal,

(18:44):
you know, as the target. But those in those days,
four hundred and eighty yards was really just uh, you know,
kind of getting getting things going. It wasn't too far
of a poke. It was it was well within my
with in my uh comfort zone, and uh, you know,

(19:05):
re remembering the in the scenario. Uh, it was late
in the afternoon. It was late in the afternoon, almost
getting on the evening. Because as soon as I took
I took one shot and uh watched it react and
watched it jump up and take a few leaps into
the timber. Now that I'm reliving the scenario, it was

(19:26):
immediately too dark, you know, it would have it's about Ah,
it was probably an hour, you know, hour and a
half uh ride on the on the quads or whatever
to even get over to that opposite side of the canyon.
So we did, we did what I suppose anybody would
would do, which was just pull out for the night,

(19:47):
not go chasing a cougar through the mountains in the dark.
And uh and and then we we showed back up
first thing, you know, first light the next morning to
go start tracking it. And h unbelievable, you know, it
wound up being a big male. I I I got

(20:09):
the I've got it wid mounted. It's it's in my parents'
log cabin, you know, down the nor Fino and and uh,
just such a neat almost you know, almost unimaginable experience.
But but but even after I killed that that male,

(20:30):
you know, for for many seasons and many years, we
would continue to see this female. She had a she
had a real large, uh white marking that came high
up on her belly and high up into her chest,
and and we had her in our scope. But you know,
time and time again watching her, we always we always

(20:51):
just assumed that she was our She was the reason
that these males were coming into the area every spring
for for mating. And so we all obviously would would
have you know, had no no desire to try to
to try to take her as an animal, even you know,
even in all the instances that we had her, we

(21:13):
just enjoyed watching her and watching her vocalize. And and
I don't I don't you know, I don't know if
it was the following year or two seasons later, but
my my hunting partner at that time, Jeremy, he you know,
we wound up spot in another big lion from the

(21:34):
very same shooting location, uh just a little further down
the canyon and sunning itself, you know, on this little
grassy bench. And I want to say his his shot
was somewhere in the about six I think it was
six seventy five, something like that, and we got his

(21:57):
whole you know, we got his whole experience on on
that on that handicam and and uh, it was the
neatest thing that it. You know, he made a perfect
shot on it. The lion just kind of rolled back
and put both both paws straight up to the air
like it was like it was praying. And and it

(22:21):
wound up being even a slightly bigger male than than
the one I had shot the season prior. And so
to to shoot two male lions from a distance that
you were able to you know, spot them, and and
and and one of the neatest parts, Like I said,

(22:41):
I mean, we're talking about the same twenty foot area
that we would go set up, you know, to hang
out in glass all day. We were in the exact
same spot on earth to have shot both of these animals.
And you know, he he I think he just wound
up getting his I don't think he got is mounted.
He just got the you know, got the hide, uh

(23:04):
tanned and and but it was it was a monster.
I I often wish I had access to my old
Night Force email because that was where so many of
our hunting stories were were photos were kicked around and
and uh uh that lion was was just a monster.

(23:25):
So you know, looking back, I I I feel like
I have a certain connection to the mountain lion. I'm
you know, I'm always I've always been highly respectful of
all of these predators. Even though I'm happy to go
and and try to hunt them. They just intrigued me.
Their their power, their their strength, and their ability to

(23:49):
to make a living in the woods has always just
just so much respect. So, uh, I'm you know, I
even though we took two of these lines out of
this canyon and and uh and have these great stories
to tell, I've always researched and read and tried to
learn as much about this particular animal and all the

(24:11):
apex predators like like them. So anyway, neat very very
cool mountain lion stories and and uh stuff that that
you couldn't make up if you tried. I just I
just wish I had better. Yeah, you know, some days
I wish that I was documenting that part of my life,

(24:32):
like I am document documenting this part of my life,
to be able to share those those memories with people
that uh, just unbelievable neat stuff.

Speaker 1 (24:42):
Yeah, yeah, you're right, very anytime anyone that spend a
lot of time in the woods, then I feel like
we all have a like some of those crazy moments,
like man, I wish I had a camera. I wish
I had maybe sometimes like I've been, I've spent a
lot of time by myself in the woods over the
years and just wished I had someone there, you know,

(25:03):
wish with me to to to see what I just saw,
Like can you believe that, like to share that stuff
with As much as I love being out alone, I do,
I do kind of wish sometimes I wish I would
have had someone with me that way, they could have
enjoyed the same spectacle that I just saw.

Speaker 2 (25:22):
It's it's such a blessing to live in a place
like this. Over the years since you know, since we
worked together and stuff. I really I had a chance
to travel all over the country on my own, you know,
with a little business that I created. And I can't
tell you how. There's a lot of pretty places around

(25:43):
the United States, but there's hardly anything that compares to
what we've got here, in my opinion anyway, and there's
there's definitely. Yeah, I just am so grateful for for
being being born in this neck of the woods. And
and to have called this place home. Uh yeah, it's

(26:09):
been unbelievable. And there's a lot of a lot of
a lot of neat memories being being shared every year
by guys like that. Uh but I I I do
often wish I had a little bit better ability to
have documented those Mountain Lion stories because it was you know,
once again, it almost it just seems surreal looking back

(26:31):
on it this many years later.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
Yeah. So at some point you and I both left
Night Force and made a decision, you know, like you know,
life's decisions, you know, you they say, they say the
most the most, the biggest decisions are some of the

(26:56):
most life changing decisions are when you buy a home
and when you change careers. And I've bought a few
different homes, and I've changed careers a few times, and
you know, you've you've done some stuff like that too.
So it doesn't come without its level of anxiety. But
you you left Night Force and you went to pursue

(27:18):
a passion that most people might scratch your head. I
don't know, you folks might even scratch their heads a
little bit. And you're like hairstream campers, what, yeah, what
are you thinking? Man? Tell us, tell us about what
sent you on your next path. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
So, you know, I've always had a really a really
strong creative it's to scratch and and I tried my best,
you know, at nightforce and through. I've always needed to
feel real connected to whatever is consuming my life, you know,

(27:56):
as much as a career would. And so even at nightfall,
you know, I found myself really trying my best to
contribute to the success of the company and what we
were building and doing, and and you know, the company
was growing fast and they're really you know, I wasn't
hired to be any sort of research and development, but

(28:18):
I really had sort of ambitions to try to at
least I could feel twinges of those being passionate desires
that I wanted to, you know, I wanted to help
shape what was happening. And the more the company grew
and the more I felt like a lot of you know,

(28:41):
it started out as a very small group group of
folks running the company, and of course just through the
success of the product, it grew pretty rapidly. And for me,
I could see my my career was becoming more and
more computer computer oriented, you know, more more even the

(29:05):
even the talk of cubicles down down the road and stuff,
and that that at least, for whatever reason at that
time of my life, I just felt like, that's going
to be hard for me to swallow if I don't
make a change now and and you know, start to
chase these these these dreams that I've got sort of
bruined inside me. But I didn't have an exit strategy,

(29:27):
and I didn't have a real great you know, I
formed one, but I didn't have a big, a big
plan as to how I was going to pursue my
own my own creative dreams. And uh, there in the
last couple of years of working at Night Force, my

(29:47):
my lady Heather, and I we we sort of fell
victim to these old vintage Airstream travel trailers. We we
bought a nineteen sixty six Airstream. I realized even back
then that there was sort of a cult following around
these old pieces of of you know, Americana. I you know,

(30:12):
we were on vacation someplace clear across the globe, uh,
you know, discussing our future and discussing our life, and
and uh it just sort of click, you know, I thought, well,
this is a big passion in our lives. It's not
something that I do for a living, but it's something
that i'm very I'm I'm drawn to and I realize

(30:33):
that there's a value in them. And so we kind
of made a made a pact together that I would
you know, maybe work probably another year while I got
my ducks in a row to try to you know,
try to organize putting together a vintage airstream restoration company.

(30:53):
And I gotta I gotta admit, once you start to
let those wheels turn in your head, a year seems
like an awfully long time. And it didn't wind up.
I wound up tapping out a little bit earlier than
the year that we set. Then we then we specified

(31:15):
and agreed to. But I went right into you know,
starting this, this self employed business all, you know, by myself.
It wasn't like I was going out to hire a
group of guys to do this. This was going to
be something that I did on my own. My my
my ambition was to go and find these you know,

(31:37):
old antique airstream trailers out in the country, which you know,
just like I'm sure you're aware, but you see these
types of things rotten away out in fields all the time,
and so away we went. I I, you know, I
began to to and even at that time, I had
been really sort of drawn to the idea of beginning

(32:01):
to document my my life and document my passions through
uh social media and through you know, through video and
and photo I guess as well back in those days.
But I began to study social media a lot, and
and early on began to recognize that that it was

(32:22):
going to become more of a thing than than it
was at that time, and that that there were I
guess I just got to give credit where credit's due.
There's a there's this lunatic out there named Gary Vee
that I began to study at least catch whims of,
and and to me, he had a lot of uh,

(32:42):
pretty pretty bona fide thoughts going on with you know,
you can make a career out of niche interests if
you're able to document them and begin to show the
world these passions that you have that aren't so mainstream.
But but so all this began to click in my
head and started the airstream business, thinking that it was

(33:05):
going to be a you know, I'll go find one
or two of these a year and begin to restore
them on my own. I've always I've always loved building
stuff and bringing something back to life. I've always appreciated
made in the USA manufacturing and things that the style
that went along with manufacturing back in those days. You know,

(33:28):
it seemed like art and beauty was more of a thing,
you know, back in the forties and fifties and sixties
than we know we know of it now. So the
neat thing about the airstream business is what started out
is I'm going to I'm going to restore these things

(33:48):
one at a time and then you know, find a
new owner for them. Wound up that I wound up
having just a knack for finding them out in the country.
And you know, my, my, I suppose my comfortable mindset
with talking to strangers and knocking on doors and and

(34:10):
you know, striking up a conversation about are you you know,
are you ever going to do anything with this thing?
And would you ever want to sell it? You know,
and and all those things came really natural to me.
And so what started out as a restoration business turned
into sort of a rescue business. I met some pretty

(34:30):
well not I met some extremely successful business owners down
in southern California that were you know, had been restoring
old airstreams for you know, for for decades and had
long lists of people lined up that wanted to have
an airstream built. But the bottleneck for them was that
they had sort of picked all of the old airstreams

(34:54):
out of the fields down in that neck of the woods.
So so the the availability of trailers that they could
tear apart and restore had dried up to a point
where all they wanted from from a guy like me
was to bring them deliver a trailer to them that
I had just found out in the country in Idaho.

(35:16):
And you know I was I was making good money
from from buying them from a very fair price, oftentimes
as being laughed at by the you know, by the
original owners saying, are you sure you want to pay
this much for this trailer? You know, it's it's been
it's just been a mouse home for the last twenty

(35:36):
years out in this field. And and you know, I
always tried to approach it with with good karma in mind.
And so anyway I would offer a fair price. I
would I would get them you know, roads safe and
travel ready, and then I would I developed all these clients,

(35:57):
these restoration clients in oftentimes southern California, big hot rod scene,
you know, just big uh uh restorations. You know that
a lot of a lot of people having things built.
But you know, you kind of just drew drew over
from from North Idaho. So I got to I got

(36:22):
to wind up just delivering these airstreams that I would
find and and buy out in the country of Idaho
down to down to that area of the country, drop
them off and and uh I laugh. Now I kind
of explain it like like sort of a my own
version of American Pickers, except for I included the delivery

(36:44):
and the and the road trip to you know, to
deliver the trailer down to the new owners. And uh,
it was a really neat chapter of life. I didn't.
It just goes to show you you you can. You
can start out with a plan, but you should always
be flexible with what you with, with how it how

(37:05):
it plays out. Because I would have never dreamt that
I could just sort of do the funnest part of
airstream restoration, which was driving around the back roads of
the woods and in Idaho and finding these old things
and buying them and bringing them home. You know, the
hunt for them was was really just a fun part

(37:26):
of life for me, and that's really what the business
turned into. So I'm grateful for that that chapter of life. Uh.
And back in back in twenty twenty one, prior to that,
I had just i'd just had a brand new shop
built that I would, you know, later down the road

(37:49):
plan to you know, to begin to build the air
build some airstreams in and and do my airstream work
in and yeah, I'll let I'll let you lead the
conversation there. But that was about when the airstream business
took the back seat to this new life that we
that we've you know, began to create. You're out on

(38:10):
our rural achorage.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
Yeah, well, I think we all have, like we get
these passion projects that we begin, and there are these
some unintended consequences that we find. Uh. For instance, you
got to be really good not only find these things,
but you got very good at documenting your journey and

(38:34):
documenting your life and and everything about that, which I
think spurred more opportunity for you as well. But then
that that you know, becoming so good at that helped
in this next transition to the next part of your
of your life, which you just alluded to. Ye Like,

(38:54):
at some point whenever your business couldn't look any cooler,
you know, yeah, an airstream life. Yeah you completely do
something different, because yeah, something completely different, and you you
doubled down on homesteading and document on that journey and
lifestyle and what what sent you that direction?

Speaker 2 (39:17):
Okay, so once again I got to give credit where
credit is truly due, and for me, I was I
was finally feeling like, all right, this business you know
that I've created, which I I've always had high hopes
and big, big dreams of it. But I've also been
I've always been a very humble person to think, you know,

(39:37):
maybe this just isn't so popular that the widespread draw
to it is going to lead to, you know, big
self employed success. So I've always you know, I've always
been I guess I've always surprised myself in the end
sometimes because I'm not I'm not assuming that I'm just

(39:59):
going to to get a home run every time. I'm
staying extremely humble. So if I if I screw it up,
I don't. I don't let myself down too much. But
at that time, my now fiance Heather. You know, her
and I have been together since back in the Night
Force days. We're coming up on eleven years now. She

(40:24):
and I had a place in the Loose Orchards at
that time in life when I was doing the airstream
stuff and for the last couple of years at Night Force,
and she was the driving force who recognized through basically
what was going on with with people trying to relocate

(40:46):
all over the country in a big way, I think,
you know, COVID started started to you know, shift people up,
and a lot of folks wanted to move further out
of the more populated areas you know, I think probably
all across the country. But in our case, you know,
the real estate market in in our little neck of

(41:07):
the woods just probably not unlike any other way any
other place around the country, but it just went crazy.
And so this home that we had been you know,
always making, always making improvements on and making sort of
our we we definitely didn't want it to be our

(41:27):
forever home, but we were we put the love into
it as though it was going to be our forever home.
So we were, uh, we had made a really pretty
three quarters of an acre property out of out of
the spot up in the list of orchards and and Heather,
you know, she came to me one one night and said,

(41:49):
I know you're not going to be able to swallow
this very well, but I think that if we wanted
to sell what we've got here, we could, you know,
we could buy acreage in the country and we could
we could do what we've always dreamed of, which is,
you know, not have any neighbors and and start over
out you know, out in the country. And that's how

(42:11):
it all started. It was, it was purely her idea.
I was. I was pretty happy with how the airstream
stuff was going. I had a brand literally a brand
new shop that I hadn't even built a single you know,
I hadn't even tackled a single airstream project in in
yet my dad had come down and helped me finish
out the the interior. I was. I was the hard

(42:36):
one to condense to do anything different at that stage
in life, because, uh, I had just reached some some
pretty big goals and in the self employed world in
my mind. And but that that's what started it all.
She she started putting the bug in my ear, you
know that that we could do something different. We could buy,

(42:57):
buy land, start over fresh. And so we began to
we basically began to shop for acreages that were we
were just window shopping, you know. We didn't we hadn't
sold the house yet, so we didn't have this cash,
you know, this chunk of money that we could go
and buy something new with. But we we started to, uh,

(43:22):
basically just shop what was available. And and we were
only looking for for a property that was kind of
within driving distance, you know, maybe maybe an hour at
the most from from where we were currently living in
in Lewiston. And so we shopped all over, you know,

(43:43):
anywhere from uh, you know, downriver to to or Fino area.
And yeah, we wound up we wound up hiking a
lot of properties. And and back in those days, we
I think we had high hopes that we would take
that money by the property and be building our house

(44:04):
within you know, a year or two afterwards. But the
reality of all that is that I'm just I guess,
a glutton for punishment. I've decided through this journey and
through being able to to help teach the world about
how this how this process goes, I haven't I haven't

(44:27):
decided to hire anybody. I don't want any you know,
my dad comes and helps me every now and again,
but I really want to build this property all on
my own, you know, just Heather and I my own
two hands and a little bit of help from family.
And as gratifying as I know that'll be, you know,
ten years down the road, looking back, it's a humbling

(44:50):
experience also because you're you. I'm a positive guide, I've
got I've got high ambitions, but uh, you know, two
hands doing all the work just it's it's a lot
slower than you think. So this is now our uh

(45:12):
you know, beginning of year. We're about three and a
half years in and we're still just loosely planning you know,
the forever home build. But so far we've we focused
on all the infrastructure of of building semi off grid
you know property out here that's where all of the

(45:37):
modern rural civilian developed. You know, I I had sort
of an identity crisis early in that first year because
I was trying to share one, like you said, just
document my journey. And I still sort of had a
social media platform name that represented the airstreams and traveling

(46:00):
across the country and and and uh, yeah, and so
I just I had I had some some nights with
my notepad and and trying to figure out how I could,
you know, build a platform that could include all of
my varied passions, whether whether it be at that time,

(46:22):
I was still really into restoring old Ford trucks, and
UH had started to old Ford truck build all this
homesteading stuff and UH and then the self sufficient side
of of beginning to create a property that the high
hopes that this property will sort of, you know, do

(46:42):
its best to take care of us as much as
we take care of it, you know, down the road.
And uh, modern rural civilian was was born on a notepad.
And so I changed all of the all the all
the social media names to that probably two and a

(47:02):
half three years ago now. And I I really can't
say how fortunate we've always been to just be sort
of a two steps ahead of where the world seems
to be wanting to go. And with with with you know,
the the commitment to selling all of our stuff in

(47:25):
order to to buy this acreage and and start this
whole new this whole new lifestyle change. I I never
would have dreamt that there would be so many anticipating
eyes wanting to see how this all plays out. Uh,
you know, from a di license, but modern rural civilians

(47:50):
started as you know, you know, a few thousand people
paying attention. And at this point, you know, across all
the different platforms, there's there's more than there's pushing two
and a half million people watching watching all of this
homesteading development unfold by my own successes and failures.

Speaker 1 (48:14):
So that's incredible. That's incredible. The uh one thing you said,
you know it, man, these two hands, It takes these
two hands a lot of time to get these projects done. Yeah.
But on social media, yeah, the the content you share,
because you share all the time and do such a
good job of like documenting and explaining your your way

(48:37):
through what you're doing. You know, you're you show the
videos of these different tasks you're completing and doing it
and why you're doing them. Do such a great job
at that. But man, it makes it look really easy. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:50):
Yeah, no, I know, and I can I can defend
the same angle because you know, I'm not a professional
in any of what I'm doing. I really probably not.
Unlike anybody in our you know, sort of age genre,
we all turn to YouTube to try to learn these
tasks that we're unfamiliar with. So if I've got to

(49:12):
fix something, if I've got to make a repair, or
if I've got to tackle a task that that I'm
unfamiliar with, then I'll spend a fair amount of time
obsessively researching that through you know, through YouTube mostly, And
that's where that's where the the the illusion begins to form,

(49:34):
because you get to watch these guys or gals that
that you're learning from tackle these tasks, you know, and
showing it all wrapped up in an hour long video.
And so, you know, I'll go to Heather and I'll say, hey,
I'm gonna I'm gonna start this project, and you know,
I think it'll probably take probably take me a couple

(49:55):
of weeks. And and uh, she's at the point now,
she said. She says to me often if I say
it's a if I if I give her a quantity
of weeks, she just converts that to the same number
of months. And so so so if I say two weeks,
she says, Mark, you you've lost your mind again. You know,
it's we're going to be You're going to be finishing

(50:16):
this up two months down the road from now. But
but it really does come from basically, I mean in
a big way, a positive outlook and a lot of
ambition to you know, kick button take names. But then
on the on the the reality side of it. You know,
if you've ever built anything or tried to DIY much

(50:38):
in your life, you it's just never as easy as
you haven't sliced out in your mind.

Speaker 1 (50:44):
So oh yeah, every time I try to do anything
di y, it's like, all right, I'm gonna make one
trip to the hardware store and buy some lumber and
buy a few screws and some stuff, and then seventeen
trips later, I'm finally Yeah, I've had to go back
an times.

Speaker 2 (50:59):
It's it's so true. Uh, and and it's it's really
humbling and and I I try my best to show people,
you know, the ups and the downs, and and uh,
I've learned that, you know, social media is such a
can can be such a polished, sort of skewed view

(51:22):
into the world that I I've really found that there's
a there's a large number of folks out there that
want to see the realities of some of this stuff.
You know, the more the more challenging parts of it.
So I've learned, I've learned through good audience reinforcement that

(51:44):
showing the failures along with the successes is uh is
pretty important people like you know, the authenticity is is
a huge priority for me, and staying vulnerable through all
is has proven to be a really good route to take,

(52:06):
at least in my experience, because I'm really good at
researching and I and I, like I said, I definitely
dig in, you know, to the extreme when it comes
to a new topic that I'm trying to learn, just
like I did back then with long range shooting. I really,

(52:26):
I really try to set myself up for success with
the knowledge that it takes to handle some of these
things you know at the very beginning stages. But you
can never you can never predict all the things that
are going to go wrong. And and I've felt, I
found that the world is appreciative when you do show
them also the things that are going perfectly. There's there's

(52:51):
some triumph in that.

Speaker 1 (52:52):
Right now. I think, I think homesteading and that type
of lifestyle is definitely you know, attractive to sports, money

(53:14):
and hunters because I feel like to at least I
kind of feel like this. I feel like people that
enjoy the outdoor and stuff. We all kind of want
to gravitate to living in an area, you know, kind
of like what you're doing, you know, semi off grid.
You know, let's get out of get out of town,
get away from neighbors. And I think, you know, like

(53:37):
our podcast says, cutting the distance and trying to cut
that down for you. So I feel like if there's
anybody that's looking to do homesteading, I think they should definitely,
you know, go watch your stuff. You know, it's it's
some some amazing stuff. For instance, I can imagine probably
some of your most popular material is your ram pump

(53:58):
that you set up. Yeah, and you I mean when
you first start doing it, it's like, oh man, this
this seems easy and cool and and everything. But as
as time goes by, it's not a there's there's little
niches in the armor here and there, like it's like, oh, well, yeah,
we have to do this to keep this thing going.
We have to clean it, we gotta you know, we
have to do all these different role things maintenance. So

(54:20):
it's not a it's not perfect, it's not it's not
a one done situation, right, And I think you back
to your point, like you try to show your you know,
trials and tribulations along with your wins. I think that's
good because you know, the ram pump, it's it's really cool.
But you know it's not a one and done thing.

Speaker 2 (54:39):
No, no, and none. None of this is you know,
I I totally agree with you. I think that outdoorsmen
these days and sportsmen are you know, back when we
grew up, it was still we had uh what I
see trending through throughout uh, you know, I'll just call

(54:59):
it social media depending on the format or whatever. Outdoorsman
and and and avid hunters. There's also sort of a
link into the health and fitness world now that I
didn't see when I was a kid growing up, which
which also in my small corner of of what I

(55:20):
do here on the homestead lends itself, you know, down
that same healthy road. Uh. You know, we're we're trying
to grow a fair amount of our of our food
in the garden that we you know, that we produce ourselves.
We've we've created uh something that that you're probably quite
familiar with a lot of small town folks that grew

(55:41):
up around the grandparents. But we've built a root seller,
you know, a place to store our our all of
our all of our food that we grow, you know,
without without taking a bunch of electricity. You know, it's
not like a walk in cooler that that. You know.
So I think that the homesteading an outdoorsman world definitely.

(56:08):
I can see how it blends itself together these days.
It's just a healthier way of life. It's it's a
more it's it's a it's a more self guided way
of of of trying to exist in on a on
a real healthy level. And you know, you see so
many big names in the outdoor world really talking about

(56:33):
how healthy. You know, a lot a lot of guys
are are eaten nothing but nothing but game meet that
you know that they're they're killing out there on a
yearly basis, and and are are real strong advocates of it.
And the more you learn about you know, just I

(56:54):
I don't ever take the extreme approach. But the healthier
I get, the the more I've been saying and often
and saying this more and more lately, is one good
habit leads to the next. And so so as I've
discovered a more healthy and clean way of living, those
those sort of small winds have have been feeled the

(57:17):
fire for the next little level of of becoming more
capable and more more healthy. Man, I want to live.
I want to live along you know life that that yeah,
I just I see so many folks that that are

(57:37):
having health issues that that you know, I'm just trying
to do what I can at this. I've started sort
of late in my in my journey, but I'm trying
my best to to eat a clean diet to to
recognize the value in in if we can't raise it

(57:58):
ourselfs and provide it for our self, then I'm looking
for a small ranch that I can try to support
to you know, to get beef that that is straight
from the farm. You know, the things that there there.
There's a lot of a lot of information out there
these days on our food system and and how you know,

(58:21):
somewhat sketchy it is. And uh and so the homesteading
lifestyle just lends itself to a really overall healthy and
capable way of living. And and and on top of that,
you're you're busting busting your butt every day, you know,
doing physical tasks that I've I've never been happier or

(58:45):
healthier and and this lifestyle has given me more fulfillment
than most anything in my life, you know, the accomplishments
that come with like you mentioned the water system. All
use the water system as a good example. But finding
a mountain spring that's you know, seeping out of a

(59:09):
rock face and studying and learning how to successfully turn
that into your water source. And then we you know,
that's exactly what we did here on this property. And
we took a sample of that water once we had
it sort of developed, and took it to a lab
to have it checked out. And this water that comes

(59:31):
right out of the mountain on our property is as
better than bottled water you could ever buy out of
the grocery store. It's safe to drink just as it is. Yeah.
And and to to turn that sort of mountain resource
into something that sustains you your life and maybe even

(59:54):
future generations of our you know, kids and grandkids on
this property has brought more joy to my short lived
life than I could ever imagine. I think, uh, I
sometimes begin to imagine what, you know, what our great grandparents,
the joys that they would get out of creating their

(01:00:15):
farm or creating their property back back in the earlier days.
And I feel like I'm I'm being blessed with a
lot of those same emotional connections, connections to the land
and and too to a life that we are slowly
departing from on a daily basis, you know, in modern living. Yeah,

(01:00:37):
the kids, the kids these days are hard pressed to
want to stay too much time outside in general, let alone,
but you know, uh, figuring out how to to turn
turn spring water into your into your farm water.

Speaker 1 (01:00:56):
So yeah, so I kind of talked about though ram
pump a little bit. Can you can you give a
quick rundown or what a ram pump is? And yeah, absolutely, Wyatt,
Why it's so cool?

Speaker 2 (01:01:09):
You bet so? A ram pump is a it's a
mechanical device that can pump water up a mountain without
any electricity or any gasoline. So it's basically a water
pump that runs off of water power. And when I
first started to research this is probably as much as

(01:01:30):
the audience might listen to that and think you are
absolutely crazy, it's it's the most magical thing to see
in action that you could ever imagine. The parts, the
parts that make up the functioning parts that make up
a rampump are just two check valves and a a

(01:01:54):
pressure tank. And what's required to operate a rampump is
three flowing water with elevation drop. So if you had,
you know, a stream that's got a good like like
a little you know, a little set of waterfalls, or
if you had even if you had a culvert that

(01:02:16):
comes out of the upper end of a cut bank
and then the water drops, you know, steeply down the
cut bank for ten fifteen feet, you know, you can
run a rampump off as little as about I think
about six feet of elevation drop. But I guess I'm
trying to paint a picture of the scenario that is

(01:02:37):
required in order to operate one. But if you have that,
if you have that scenario, and then even more importantly,
if you have a water source that you have access to,
but it's it's not let's just say like on our property,
that water source is down below the site that we
want to build our home on. So so you know,

(01:02:58):
the ram pump is a way that we can take
that mountain spring that I've developed into a water source,
pump it into the ram pump, and it uses it
uses about seventy percent of the inbound water to cycle
the two check valves, therefore pumping about thirty percent of

(01:03:19):
the overall water that's you know, that's running into it
up the mountain. So a lot of people make the
mistake a saying that it's a wasteful way of pumping water.
But the reality of it is that you've got this
constantly flowing water source that's going to run over the
mountain whether you put a rampump in its path or not.

(01:03:42):
And if you do put a rampump in its path
like we have here on this property, that pump the rampump.
The system that I've designed is using eighteen feet of drop.
It's it's being fed by about four gallons a minute
of constant flow, twenty four hours a day, and it's

(01:04:03):
moving water up the mountain one hundred feet in elevation
rise through six hundred linear feet of pipe to a
giant two thousand gallon you know, holding tank. And then
the way that I've got our system set up is
then that two thousand gallons of of rampump delivered water

(01:04:26):
at the top of our mountain sits at least fifty
feet above any of the areas that we use on
the property. So then the water that comes out of
the bottom of that tank is then routed into a
complete homestead or farm distribution underground distribution system. And so
when there's no electricity involved in the whole system, so

(01:04:48):
the rampump moves the water up the mountain, up far
above where we use the water from. And then when
we turn on a spicott down here in the guard
or whatever, the gravity pressure from that tank being so
much higher than where we're sitting gives us. You know,

(01:05:08):
it's not it's not like a fire hose type pressure,
but it is extremely significant water pressure. And and there's
not a there's not an ouse of electricity or field
being used for the whole system. So it's a I
didn't invent any any of what I've just described, but
it's one of those niche tools that I think were

(01:05:31):
maybe a lot more common one hundred years ago on
properties where spring water was more valued. You know, in
these days, it's so common that a person would buy
an acreage and just immediately go have a well drilled,
and I think, you know, a century ago, I think

(01:05:52):
that was far less realistic. I think you were looking
for a water source on your property that was that
was surfacing, like a like a spring or an artesian well.
And so I've become fully obsessed with with rampump technology.
It's it's uh, you know, it's it's nothing new, it's nothing,

(01:06:14):
but but it is hard to believe if you just
hear it for the first time, that that you can
do this or that it's possible. So yeah, a big uh.
I'm really just documenting the projects as they come and go.
But I'm I'm much slower than I wished I were
when it comes to, you know, bringing this property towards

(01:06:36):
the ultimate dreams that I have for it. So a
big part of the of the content that I've produced
on homestead development has been the rampump driven water system
just because it's it's physically taken me a lot of
work to get it to where it's at now. And
but I shake my head at it every time I

(01:06:57):
every time I use it, and every time that I
see it in action. It's, uh, it's like magic. It
really is like magic. There's no there's no other way
to describe it. So but but I've completely built the
pump out of nothing but you know, brass fittings from
from the hardware store or in maybe in some cases

(01:07:19):
fittings that I've ordered offline, but nothing that's nothing that
I've went and contracted a machine shop to build or
anything like that. It's all parts that you that any
one of us could go and research, you know, the
design of a rampump and put one together. And uh,
you just have to have that that landscape that I've described, basically,

(01:07:41):
that falling, constantly flowing water, and you can you can
pump water uphill without you can pump water uphill by
the force of water, far far beyond your wildest dreams.
It's it's crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:07:56):
And our our forefathers were pretty smart.

Speaker 2 (01:07:59):
Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (01:07:59):
Yeah, they knew how to like do the unthinkable with
very little. You know, the technology they had back then
versus today is incredible. But how they eat down a
living in those those wild places is is downing. And
I'm glad that you're able to have to research that
and and share it with everybody on your platform as such,

(01:08:23):
modern modern rural civilian. I mean it kind of like
it's a very good it's a very good name, and
you're sharing, you know, in modern times, these rural things
and and all these like maybe some of this lost
technology that not a lot of us know about our
everyday lives. Yeah, so I think that's really cool.

Speaker 2 (01:08:43):
It's neat to you know, at this point, I get
messages and feedback from people all over the globe about
the ram pump experience that they've had, or the ram
pump that they've seen when they were a child, or
you know, in lesser developed places on Earth. There's unbeknownst

(01:09:04):
to me before I started this, this you know, this
whole journey and trying to share it with everybody, but
there's you know, there's villages in very remote places, uh,
you know, all over the all over the globe that
are their lives have changed because of the you know,
somebody explaining to them, hey, we can we can build

(01:09:26):
a rampump system, and we can build we can bring
this water that you guys pack for you know, a
mile in buckets, we can we can bring it right
to your right to where your village is. And to me, uh,
I just think it's amazing. But uh lesser obviously, you know,

(01:09:46):
you'd have to choose to want to do this with
all the options that Americans have as far as technology
and things go. But I'm always trying my best to
whenever I come to crossroads about this is the amenity
that I'm trying to develop on our homestead property. How

(01:10:08):
how was it done, you know, one hundred years ago
versus what's what are people doing now? And if there's
a way that I can combine the two and get
you know, I don't predict that the world's going to
fall apart or that we're all going to be you know,
I don't fall victim to this doomsday sort of outlook

(01:10:30):
on where the world's at. I'm a very positive person,
but we did see some disruptions and supply chains, and
I'm always trying to on this homesteff property develop an
off grid alternative to a grid powered comfort that we've
all become so spoiled by. You know. So the rampump

(01:10:54):
set up is my answer to having an electricity free
water system that will keep our farm irrigated and keep
fresh the best water I've ever drank, you know, coming
out of all of our faucets all the time without Yeah,
just it's just wild. You can do that with no

(01:11:14):
electricity these days?

Speaker 1 (01:11:16):
Yeah? Yeah, Well, daughter's life, yes, sir. Yeah, Now you
have you have this quote quotation that you like to
share on your page. A lot it says it's better
to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener.

Speaker 2 (01:11:31):
In a war.

Speaker 1 (01:11:31):
Is that how it goes?

Speaker 2 (01:11:32):
Yeah, yep, yep, yeah. And you know, I don't even
know if anybody can say where that quote came from.
I think it's thousands of years you know, a thousand
years old and interpreted from other languages. But a big
part of my carryover from the exposure that we got

(01:11:53):
to the precision shooting world and to the firearms related,
you know, precision shooting sports and all of what I
became so highly addicted to through our years at nightforce
has continually been a passion in my in my life,
you know, here in the country, and I always love

(01:12:15):
to shoot, just to shoot, to be proficient at accuracy
and be challenged by the technology that goes into it
in the science. But I think for me that quote
ties back into, you know, there's a certain aspect of homesteading,
in in modern homesteading that is tying into protecting your family,

(01:12:42):
protecting your property, protecting just just being a protector in general.
And you know, I never would have dreamt that that
all of these interests and super you know, very very
pronounced passions in my personal life would would all sort
of melt into this modern homesteading movement. But but it's big.

(01:13:06):
Like you know, I know that you you probably remember
and and we're quite well aware of all the Special
Operations groups interactions that we had through through Night Force
and and you know, you see a lot of those guys.
I've become. This platform bridges the gap unfairly. I got

(01:13:29):
to tell you, you know, I'm not oftentimes I'm humbled
by the relationships that I've been able to form, uh
you know, through through the success of the Channel and
what modern rural civilians has become for folks out there.
But there's a lot of uh retired you know, there's

(01:13:51):
a lot of retired Special Operations guys that are big
into the homesteady movement, just like there are a lot
of a lot of sportsmen, you know, are beginning to
sort of it's all, it's all melting into one pot.
So I like to back in those Nightforce days when
you and I first met, I was very obsessed with

(01:14:15):
long range you know, shooting. But one thing that I
was and when we were growing up, you know, I
I had the awesome experience of of taking a lot
of my first animals, you know, offhand at one hundred yards,
you know, with with with my dad's rifle, and uh,

(01:14:37):
but I never tried to be good at shooting close
range and training training with firearms in a different in
the opposite regardless long range shooting. So now, yeah, so
I get a lot of enjoyment out of flat range training,
you know. Uh. I was never a an obsessed pistol shooter,

(01:15:01):
you know. But but those are all interests that I've
you know, sort of graduated onto now with with living
in the country and being able to to get out
more and and so yeah, the the quote that you
mentioned it's better to be a warrior in the garden
than a gardener in a war is just simply I

(01:15:23):
resonate really strongly with it, because we are trying our
best to to continue to be protectors in this environment
and to be capable when it comes to uh the
whatever warrior means in your in your you know, in
your lifestyle. But the the quote just is a is

(01:15:46):
a really cool quote that I've always gravitated towards. So
I like to share that I've got some I've got
a new apparel design that even uses that same phrase.
In the bottom of the of the design coming out
so very cool. I love that. I love that quote.

Speaker 1 (01:16:05):
Yeah, I love it too. Well, man, I can't tell
you how happy I am to have you on the
podcast and catch up. And it's been a long time.
I mean we saw it the gas station here a
year or so ago. But yeah, but it's just in passing.
But it's good to catch up and and uh but
I feel like I keep pretty good tabs on you
on social media and you, I'm sure the same, you know,

(01:16:27):
single share. But how can folks best find you if
they want to look you up on the interwebs or
the Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:16:37):
Like you've mentioned a number of times, you know, the
the the Modern Rural Civilian is the name of my platform.
I'm I've I've begun to share content on every major
social media platform, whether you know, be from from Instagram
to Facebook to to YouTube, all all of those platforms.

(01:16:59):
So even if you just uh, you know, We've got
a small website, Modern Rural Civilian dot com that I'm
beginning to grow to try to share plans and design
knowledge of of you know, some of the things that
I've accomplished here on the property. But just type in
modern rural civilian on whatever whatever sort of entertainment device

(01:17:22):
that you use, and you should come up with something.
So it's humbling too to have seen it grow like
it like it has. And yeah, I'm I'm always, uh
so so proud of of watching your journey as well, Derek.
I I think that I was just talking to Heather

(01:17:44):
this morning about just kind of the neat correlations between
you know, uh, chasing, chasing our dreams and and going
after something that you know, for some people seems a
little bit unrealistic and maybe like like you know, like
waste of energy. Uh. And I just really appreciate watching

(01:18:06):
your your journey and how much you get to do,
you know, what you're passionate about, and what your life
has grown into outside of where we want scout to
see each other on a daily basis. It makes me smile.

Speaker 1 (01:18:20):
Yeah, yeah, thank you. Yeah. I think I think the
big correlation there is we both are doing something that
we love and we would we would still be doing
it whether we had an opportunity to document it or not.
Now you'd still be doing hard work and doing these accomplishments.
And you know, somewhere along the line, you built a

(01:18:43):
knack for sharing that with folks and engaging that and
and I feel like for myself it's kind of the
same thing. If if I I would, I'm gonna ill
count till the day I die, hopefully yeah, years old or.

Speaker 2 (01:18:58):
Something absolutely absolutely either either way, you know, I think
that's I think that's one of the biggest things that
people are missing out on these days. And age is
chasing after something so hard that you find, you know,
you find some success in it to a point where
you realize, Man, I would be doing this, whether it
was just on the weekends or not, I would be

(01:19:19):
doing I'd be doing this if there was no success
in it, no nobody watching. But to turn your you know,
even to turn just a sliver of what you call
your career into something that you'd be doing for free
outside of it is a blessing beyond anything that I
could have ever imagined. And I'm just really humbled and
grateful for for the life that I've built and watched

(01:19:45):
you build, you know, in the same.

Speaker 1 (01:19:46):
Way, Man, I love it. Thank you so much that
I think we'll call it at that. I mean, I
think you wrapped that up and framed it perfect. For
some last words, there and and so yeah, I appreciate
coming on, and uh, we'll catch everybody on the flip flop.

(01:20:07):
H