JORDDØGN SAMTALE: Jordnært arbeid

We can buy everything we want in stores or pay others to make it for us.

So why should we make things ourselves? What do we gain from using our own hands and bodies to build, forge, gather, butcher, or knit?

Hands-on work is about using what comes from the earth and taking care of what's around us. It's about the desire and ability to build a life in a practical, physical, and creative way.

Perhaps it's also a way to connect with, and live in harmony with, the nature around us?

Siri Helle is an agronomist, author, and journalist. She writes about food for Dag og Tid and has written about building her own outdoor toilet in her book Med berre nevane (or Handmade. Learning the Art of Chainsaw Mindfulness in a Norwegian Wood, as the English version is titled). She has also written Trollefossvegen 23, tilbake til heimbygda about a year of house building, love, hunting, and hard work.

Solveig Aareskjold has written novels and non-fiction books and is a regular columnist for Klassekampen. She is currently working on a book about Homer, where craftsmanship is highly valued and serves as a way to reduce the gap between master and servant. Aareskjold is an enthusiastic amateur craftsman herself, having sewn her first coat at nineteen.