(Beware, another mega-post incomming!)
The original polymath
My grandfather was a jack of all trades and my greatest influence when it comes to lifestyle and philosophy. My grandfather's choices were influenced by his path through life, and although he never talked much, his story tells some valuable lessons.
He was born in the early 1930ies as the youngest of 7 brothers on a farm close to a lake. His father died when he was still young, but his mother fought fiercely to keep all her kids and the farm under her care – which was quite a feat for a woman back then. The war and economy made times rough, all boys learned to work the fields and tend to the animals from a very young age, and help raise their younger brothers. When the older brothers went off to apprenticeships and the military, they kept in touch with frequent postcards and letters home (which I still have in a box). My grandfather got an apprenticeship as a machinist, which presented a leg up from rural society and the chance to work in towns. A popular choice was to spend a year abroad to learn French, which my grandfather spent working at a confectioner and learned baking. He also spent some time in French Switzerland, where his oldest brother oversaw an apple orchard and learned to prune trees, harvest fruit and process apples.
He found a machinist job close to home and rented a small attic room, from where he walked to the factory every day. He met and fell in love with my grandmother (working as a nurse at the time). Him being from a Protestant family and her from a Catholic one, they married secret at a small chapel with nobody present but another couple, serving as their mutual witnesses. They drove off together a small Vespa, spending their honeymoon on the French Cote d’Azur with nothing but a tent, the clothes on their back and some cooking gear. They lived in a tiny town apartment, both continuing to work until the birth of their 3 kids. Being a savvy saver, my grandfather managed to get a plot of land in a nearby village and a small bank loan. He started planning and building his house: building materials were sourced from sales, scrap yards or renovations, equipment rented or lent from small businesses, help employed from friends on weekends and holidays. He taught himself how to design building plans, set up heating or install sanitation from technical handbooks. The only thing he didn’t do was the electrical wiring: a friend from work came and installed it on a few weekends. As soon as the shell of the building was up, the family moved in, their youngest son was still a toddler. Our family pictures show the tree kids playing on gravel heaps and in wheelbarrows. My grandfather was able to design a home perfectly suited for their life and for the future. While I’m not sure this would still be possible today due to all the regulations, I am still in awe of the man that built his family house with his own hands.
He continued to work as a machinist in a watch factory until retirement (the regular kind). Along the way, he picked up watchmaking and beekeeping as a hobby. He was the guy who could salvage three broken radios from the dump and make one working one. He was the guy who drove his car for 20 years, never bringing it to a garage for service. He was the guy waiting besides uprooted trees after a storm, waiting to take the firewood off the cleanup crew’s hands. He cultivated the land around his house with veggies and fruit trees, providing his family with food throughout the year (there was even a greenhouse made entirely from old windows). Retirement was simply a transition from salaried work to more work around the home, in the garden, in the workshop and with the bees.
I spent my weekends with my grandparents and was even allowed to live with them for some time. As a kid, I had unsupervised adventures in the forest or drove to the dump with my grandpa to hunt treasures. I worked on little projects with him in the ever-growing workshop. I rummaged the massive collections of material in the attic and the sheds. I learned cooking and sewing from my grandma, and welding, beekeeping and handiwork from my grandpa. When I got older, we collaborated on different projects, house-sitted a farm together or he asked for my help on tasks he could not do himself. Being with him was enjoyable because we did not have to talk much. We could easily spend hours without verbal communication, just being at peace in each other’s presence. He never told me “I love you”, or any of his children. But when I had to move to University, he went to the attic and brought me an entire apartment’s worth of kitchen equipment (complete with a 30-year old pressure cooker I still use today), desk and study lamp. And he was so proud when I finished High School as the first person in my family. So he cared about me a lot.
I never talked much about finances with my grandpa. He obviously was a saver, and from I young age I emulated his behavior, saving my allowance and money gifts in a candy box. Still he must have had some knack for investing, and he always did his own taxes. He also bought my grandma’s parents’ house when they died, restored it and rented it out. But most of his money was in stocks and bonds. I remember talking investment once, during the market crash of 2008. He said he barely lost anything, because he never invested in things he did not understand (=subprime American real estate hedge funds). I guess he could have retired early if he wanted, but being from the post-war generation, that was just not something you’d consider. Perhaps he also enjoyed his work, it was at a very friendly company – they sent him a deli food basket every Christmas, even after he retired. On the other hand he obviously had enough projects to keep himself busy without the work.
My grandma was in some respect the polar opposite of him. She was a lively, loud woman, liked to phone everybody she knew and had a global network of friends from traveling and working as a nurse for Doctors without borders. She traveled to America, Australia and all over Europe. She was open to new technology, learned to text and e-mail and surf the internet. A weaker woman would have suffered under my grandfather’s penny-pinching miserliness, but my grandma went along with it, taking the liberty to splurge on the luxuries she didn’t want to miss (clothes and shoes, coffee and cake, holidays). It helped that she had her own money.
After a full life, my grandpa died in the summer of 2011. He suffered a brain hemorrhage while working in the summer heat with his bees. He was flown to the hospital, but there was little to be done and he never woke up. While his sudden death – especially in light of his great health – was a shock to us all, it was good for him to go quickly and with little suffering while still active and doing the things he loved. Being bedridden and frail for a long time before his death would have been terrible for him. My grandma followed him soon after.
My grandfather was by childhood hero, but having grown up and having seen how other people live, I can see his lifestyle in a more critical light too. While it was nice to have a stash of random stuff for fixing houses, electronics, cars, etc around, the yard, attic and shed really looked like something out of “Hoarders” – to the constant annoyance of my grandma and the neighbors. Someone’s trash may be another ones treasure, but perhaps my grandfather took it a bit far. He apparently also did some semi-legal stuff with his taxes, which only came out after his death. He never went on holiday except for once, when my grandma enforced a family vacation on the Balearic Isles: he went along, but his luggage was filled with 2 weeks’ worth of homemade granola. He never adopted the internet or even the use of a simple cellphone. He barely had any friends, never went to community events, rarely traveled out of his county. His main contacts were his brothers and sons, who have adopted very similar lifestyles, and a few guys he met over common interests.
TLDR version: My grandfather chose to live a simple, self-reliant life, away from consumerism. I try to keep the downsides in mind and not put my him on a pedestal, however I still think there are many positive lessons to be learned from the lives of my grandfather and grandmother. Here are a few:
Lessons to be learned from my grandpa
- Live significantly below your means, save and invest in what you understand
- Learn to DIY as much as possible, never outsource services you could possibly learn yourself
- Continue to learn new skills and challenge yourself
- Think critically about advertised products
- Don't spend a fortune on your wedding and honeymoon - all you need is love!
- Reach out to likeminded people for help and expertise (instead of “buying” a solution)
- Travel light while working and see the world when you’re young, then settle down where you feel most comfortable and build a self-reliant life
- Don’t give a F about appearances (clothes, car, house), but do what serves you and is practical
- Only spend time with people that appreciate you (for being a penny-pinching polymath)
- Master the 30s phone call
- Show your love by providing actual help (with projects, supplies, moving)
- Cultivate your hobbies until they provide a side income (repair, beekeeping)
Lessons to be learned from my grandma
- What you have in abundance, give freely (veggies + fruit, flowers, time, sage advice…)
- Don’t forget to enjoy life, and spend money on the things that are important to you
- Establish and uphold good relationships with your neighbors and friends, and you will never lack a helpful hand or ear
- Show your love by home cooked meals and personal talks
- Have friends all over the globe, so you can travel!
- Learn to preserve by pickling, freezing, pasteurizing, storing
- Embrace new things (technology, innovations, cuisine)