For my job at the Nature Conservancy, I spend a lot of time planning fieldwork in remote places where I study how conservation benefits people in poor communities. So I approached my family’s year in the woods as if it were fieldwork in a new country. I read all I could before going and talked to people who were already living off the grid in the woods of Maine to understand the local risks.  Unexpected problems always arise in fieldwork, but it’s part of the adventure. How else could I know to never give Stalin a thumbs down in Azerbaijan or the importance of quick reflexes on Highway One in Vietnam?  For the north woods of Maine, I learned about the dangers of the mother moose, deer ticks and poison ivy. I gleaned tips on surviving the long, cold winter. Unsurprisingly, it’s what I didn’t know that made the last few weeks painful.  Our cabin by the lake came with a propane-powered refrigerator. I knew these from RV’s, and I performed the manual’s recommended maintenance before lighting it for the first time. For a month all was fine.  But one evening we smelled a lot of gas fumes in the house. It was our first evening without a hint of wind, and our three gas lights burned in addition to the always-burning propane fridge. I thought we had a ventilation problem and opened all the windows and doors. Yet an hour later the carbon monoxide detector I had installed when we arrived began to beep. We had just put the boys to bed in the loft, so we brought them downstairs where the fumes were less strong and shut off the gas lights. The detector eventually stopped its warning.  After checking the boys’ room in the loft to ensure it was clear of fumes, we all went to bed. Forty-five minutes later we awoke to loud beeps and “warning carbon monoxide” repeated again and again. This time it had to be the fridge because nothing else had a lit flame. Trying to fix the problem late at night with little light was a bad idea, so we all slept downstairs near the open doors and windows.  The next morning I reread the fridge manual to see if I had missed something. The fridge needs to be defrosted periodically, so I started there. While the fridge was off, I decided to clean the gas flue and burner as described in the manual. I found that the flue pipe had a layer of soot that partially blocked the flue. When I relighted the fridge, it no longer gave off the strong fumes.  For a few days all was well, but then the fumes came back. This time I went online with the satellite Internet and read a dozen Web pages describing propane fridge problems and solutions. I learned that spiders are attracted to the smell of propane and that the area near the gas burner needs to be entirely free of cobwebs and dust. I also learned that the fridge needed to be level. When I did this and cleaned the flue and burner again, the problem was solved.  I hate to think, however, what could have happened if we had not had the carbon monoxide detector. So now we have two detectors in the cabin.  A week later, I stopped to clear a fallen tree blocking the road. When the tree fell, it pinned a branch that was bowed with tension. A week before, we attended an event on logger skills where competitors released tension from a bowed sapling with a cut underneath, a pause to let the sapling buckle and a light cut on the top.  The professional loggers made it look too easy. When I tried it on the pinned branch with my handsaw, the branch still had enough force to throw the handsaw back into my face as I made the final cut, leaving a gash near the tear duct of my right eye. A quarter-inch to the right, and it would have been ugly. No eye protection and not understanding the risks almost injured my eye when I was out of cellphone range on a seldom-used rural road. Worse yet, I really did not need to cut the branch to move the tree.  Not long after that, I left a window open without a screen, and the next morning we discovered a bat in the house. Our indoor-only cats thought this was way more fun than a laser pointer. They made futile jumps into midair as the bat flew by and acted like bird dogs, pointing to where the bat was hiding.  But bats and cats don’t play well together and rabies are a rare but dangerous issue with bats, so I covered myself up and caught the bat in my fishing dip net and released it outside. A bat coming in an open window is another risk, albeit an unusual one, that never crossed my mind.  I was also surprised by the remnants of Hurricane Irene that hit our part of the woods hard. We knew the wind and rain were on the way and that falling trees were a big risk. The children slept on the floor downstairs rather than in the loft in case a tree hit the cabin. I also moved the cars away from any big trees. I pulled our canoe out of the water and ensured that our heavy folding kayak was upside down on the dock and tied off.  The wind howled that night with gusts up to 50 miles per hour. The children and cars were fine, but the wind blew the folding kayak off the dock and broke the mooring rope. The waves and the rocks did the rest, and in the morning I found the kayak with holes and broken ribbing. It was a sad loss because the folding kayak was a gift to us, a marvel of engineering, and it was entirely preventable.  I realize now that doing my homework about the risks in the Maine woods was not enough. Years of urban and suburban living have changed how my mind assesses risks. I am attuned to the urban risks from bad drivers, traffic jams, and A.T.M. security — risks that come from other people. Here in the woods, the day-to-day risks are less about people and more about unfamiliar tools, adverse weather and being alone. Self-reliance and taking time to think about even a simple task matter much more now.  I have much yet to learn about the northern woods of Maine, and there is much more that I will never learn in one year. I may have a new scar or two by the end, but I hope they remind me of the good times in the Maine woods rather than the bad.  So I have a new experience in a new place to add to the life list: in rural Maine forget about the branches and just focus on getting the tree out of the road. Words to live and see by.
Living off the grid in Maine, the author escapes rabies, a serious eye injury and carbon monoxide poisoning. Phew. But a storm damages the family's kayak.