I’m going to continue on my simplicity theories; I just don’t see any other way to manage a large family. We’re not a democracy but I’m also not a dictator. I set the rules, someone has to be in charge, and the ultimate responsibility is always mine.

I both demand and demonstrate structure, stability, routine and positive expectations. I expect the kids to attend church, to participate in family activities, to follow rules, to help me and all the other kids. I stay on them all like white on rice, as that’s my dadgum job as a mama. I’ll be 53 soon, almost halfway through my intended life expectancy, but I’m sure not slowing down. If anything I’m now so comfortable in who I am, so determined to help children, that my over-confidence and abundant energy daunts even me at times.

Rereading Rural Renaissance by John Ivanko and Lisa Kivirist, I’m taken again by their emphasis on simplicity. A married couple who’d left their stressful ad agency lives in Chicago for the country life, operating a sustainable Bed & Breakfast in Wisconsin, they write that less time spent on material things is more time spent on family.

This little hillbilly, pictured here, had gone to the Navy Great Lakes Base twice for different son’s graduations, and one time I’d rented a car and gone up into Wisconsin. In my mind, anything north of the Mason Dixon line must be all cities so I was obviously and pleasantly surprised by the green beauty of Wisconsin in late June. I also found it cold as I’m accustomed to steaming, humid air masses down in the Deep South that might suffocate others.

Voluntary simplicity is the process by which we and millions of others are examining our lives, asking what’s important, valuable and needed; defining for ourselves when enough is enough, then taking steps to change the way we live and work.

My family spends the great majority of our time at home for several reasons. Some of my kids are hardly fit for public; church and school alone stresses them with their normal behavior requirements. The strain of maintaining one’s traumatized emotions all day in school are evident on their faces when they return home some days, the effort nearly making their hearts burst one might assume by the torrent of words and feelings that they belch out to me when they reach their perceived safety zone which is our home.

Jumping on the trampolines so hard that we’ve broken half a dozen of them now in the last decade, another one bit the dust last week, or jumping off the diving board until exhaustion sets in are acceptable family methods here for venting and eliminating stress buildups. For me it is always the gardens, for the kids it is never found in any sort of work but is usually accomplished through fun physical activities like bike riding or soccer.

Since some might find the old KISS acronym insulting (Keep It Simple Stupid), I won’t say it aloud, but do follow its precepts as it simply works for us at all times.