My father was completely strict, however never drastic.
He had grown up while in a depression, struggling for each and every dollar, so he was truly large on being self sufficient as much as possible.
Before I could drive a car, I had to learn about the car, and completely know how to repair many of the smaller complications that would end up coming up! Although he had never been homeless (to my knowledge) he was also insistent on showing me outdoor survival skills, in case I would need to survive outside for a lengthy period of time. His point was that I relied heavily on Heating, Ventilation, in addition to A/C appliances in addition to other furnaces for surviving in the drastic winters. I basically needed to learn other ways. As it turns out, I had to be a very speedy learner, because before I was ready there was a major problem with our central gas furnace. It was just under 20 degrees outside, and supposed to be going sub-zero by daybreak, so both of us required a fire in the fireplace. With the fireplace blazing both of us could easily rest in that room, close to it, and both of us wouldn’t have to worry about the lack of central heating. The pressure was surely on me to get it going, in addition to although my hands were trembling, within 15 minutes I had the fireplace going. It felt wonderful to be able to do that for my family, and take care of everything myself. So my father was definitely right about relying on furnaces too much… Later that evening, when the fire was winding down, my father got up in addition to updated the batteries in the temperature control unit. The heating appliance never had been broken that whole time!