Margaret Gallagher, 83, lives in Ireland without electricity

Margaret Gallagher She's 83 years old and lives a few miles from Belcoo, a small town in Northern Ireland. She hasn't used electricity since she was just 10 years old, but she's not an environmental extremist, and she's never considered herself a climate hero. Just a woman who made a choice and, every day, faces it with ease. 

Margaret's house has a roof of straw and the stone and clay walls. Heat comes from the fireplace, which warms the entire apartment perfectly, and water comes from a well fed by a natural spring.

He doesn't have a refrigerator, but the lack of one has only been a stimulus to his ingenuity and never a problem. To keep butter fresh, he wraps it in a cabbage leaf and uses all the waste produced for the composting. Obviously he doesn't have a computer or a television, but only a battery-powered radio. Lighting is provided by candles and oil lamps, and the plants are watered with water.rain water.

Margaret has never been a vegetarian: she loves meat, bacon, pancakes, cakes.

The cottage has never changed since her family purchased it over a century ago. She was still a child when her mother died. From then on, she decided to spend her life with her father in Belcoo, caring for him (he spent the last 17 years of his life bedridden with severe rheumatism) and tending the family farm of twelve acres. 

Winter nights in Belcoo are very cold, but for Margareth, that's never been a problem: to keep warm, she uses two hot water bottles, one for her feet and one for her body. And, of course, plenty of blankets. 

The most striking thing in Margaret's testimony, it is the simplicity with which he tells his radical choice, and his final thought: "If my parents lived so well here, why can't I do the same?" Meanwhile, every week he receives visitors curious about his lifestyle.

The cover image is from The Irish Times

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