Throwing Stones in a Glass House: Physically and Metaphorically

Where we left off

Following the high of running my mountain race, I remember sitting in the train on the 40 minute ride out of the city and to the country side. It was here that I had been living on a self-sufficient farm for 2 weeks prior. A place where we relied on solar power, recycled everything, and did not buy meat or vegetables because we supplied our own. I disembarked the train and rode my bike the 15 minute ride down back roads to the farm. I remember a distinct feeling of accomplishment, it was as if everything that elicited stimulation was pleasant: the grass, the road, the wind, the warmth of the sun, the smell of the mountains. However, I had a very unpleasant feeling in the pit of my stomach. What I did not write about prior to the race is the chasm that was developing between my hosts and me, and returning back to the farm meant having to “endure” this unspoken tension.

Slaveaway

It is hard to describe exactly what made interaction with them so unpleasant, but I will try to do my best to paint the picture without bias. With the website I am using to travel, you request to volunteer for a hosts and in return they give you a place to stay and feed you. The perks vary from host to host. Some hosts work you 15 hours a week but only provide breakfast. Some hosts work you 30 hours a week but provide everything. However, generally the work is 20-25 hours and 1-2 meals are eaten together each day with the kitchen and supplies free for the other meals. My first day on the farm I remember gathering around the table in the kitchen and asking about the type of work, hours, times, and general need to know stuff. The response I received was two fold, “Here we don’t call them Workaways, we call them Slaveaways, but work as you wish.” I pretty quickly saw through this “as you wish” expression that is so common in France. The real meaning I would soon find out is more akin to “do what you want and if it isn’t what we want, we’re going to treat you badly.” However, I immersed myself in the farm and I remember working no less than 10 hour days my first week, I took one day off. I was so isolated in the mountains that there really wasn’t much to do other than to hike or work, and if you worked all day you didn’t want to hike. Honestly though it was enjoyable. Building things and taking care of the crops and animals of the farm was entirely rewarding. The only drawback was the communication between my hosts and me. They did not enjoy speaking English and rarely spoke it around me unless they were telling me how to do something, and even then there was often times something misinterpreted. I chalked it down to the fact that I am strong willed and my male host was as well. 

The story you did not know

After the first week or so the man left the farm for what was suppose to be a couple of days. During that time he had given me a list of tasks to do and I completed them to the best of my ability and knowledge. However, a couple of days turned into an entire week away. The final days before he returned were the days I was sick. So what was suppose to be a week worth of work accomplished was closer to 2 days worth of work. Then as he was arriving I was leaving for the race, and we did not get to talk to each other until I returned. So, there was undoubtedly some grief on each end. I felt undervalued and not appreciated and ostracized. He felt I did not like what I was doing or believe in his farm. It was an unfortunate series of events. 

Fast forward, the day of my return from the race, and I am overeager with accomplishment. I am begging to just tell someone of the crazy adventure I had. I go to the kitchen for dinner, I see the male host and his daughter eating ice cream. He doesn’t even speak to me. I say hello and conversation is non-existent. I knew at this moment things were not looking promising. The next morning I woke up and went down for breakfast before work, and I see them sitting in the open air of the kitchen table bundled up in their jackets with only the faintest hints of sunlight. I sit down with knots in my stomach. He looks at me and says, “Joshua, are you excited to be here?” Me trying not to accept the reality of what he might be about to say replied with an over eager, “Heck yeah I am.” I don’t think the joke translated.. He further elaborated how he felt that I was not happy on the farm and that I did not enjoy the work. The female host added to it with how she felt that I was just taking my time doing things when they were still in a mad dash to get prepared for winter. For those of you who know me intimately will know how this might actually be the worst thing a person could tell me. How these words cut me not only to the core of my being but on some metaphysical level my actual soul received the wound. That they could tell this to a person who slaved away everyday for hours and hours only to be reciprocated with a bed and food. I was trying to process the flood of emotions and trying even harder not to let my face give away how I felt on the inside. So I told him how it was unfair that he wanted me to treat the farm as if it was my farm, when they don’t treat me like I belong on the farm. I expressed how for once I would like for someone to ask me a question about how I felt or what I thought or include me in a conversation. 

Realization and action

Then I realized, the problem. We all had these built up griefs from not communicating. We all had these burdens we decided to bear for the greater good. We all felt misunderstood *Cue Blink 182 song. Seriously though, we had these unnecessary problems that were making us resent each other. All the problems stemmed from how we spoke to one another and how we wanted to be spoken to. I needed affirmation that my work was acceptable and I needed to feel like I was wanted there. They needed someone who was interested in their work not just their lives. They needed someone who worked with a smile not a serious face. They needed affirmation that I believed they were doing something good in this world. From that point on we decided to be entirely open about our communication and be mindful of how easily things can get misunderstood with the language barrier. We developed a sense of trust with one another. I told them I would do better to be enthusiastic and be vocal about how I wanted to be there. They told me they would do better about asking me questions. It was such an explosive morning where we all were on the verge of tears, and then suddenly after we explained our grieves we realized that we were actually cared for more than we knew, none of us showed it in the right way though.

From that moment on, we got along very nicely. We weren’t afraid to joke with each other. We had a smile in the mornings, they made me some french snacks and I fried them potato chips (which actually turned out to be a huge hit with the kids). We stayed up late talking about nothing, and sometimes we didn’t talk at all but simply enjoyed each others company. We started playing music in the kitchen, they exposed me to some French folk songs and I taught them a thing or two about the rap game. It truly felt like a family, the work was still incredibly tough but just when I might feel exhausted or tired or running on fumes one of them would ask me a question about my life or about my future, and it would be okay.

Life on the farm

I took some videos of the farm, and I hope that will help elucidate what life was like there. However, for the purpose of context I want to take a minute and describe what exactly the purpose, reason, and function of the farm was. Jean-Philippe the male host studied electrical engineering, at one point in life he threw caution to the wind and decided he wanted a simpler life. For years he accumulated relationships, materials, and land that would allow for him to accomplish what he wanted. He knew he was by no means educated enough to tackle the job of starting a self sufficient farm, he learned through constant research, trial and error as well as hosting volunteers with know how. One of those volunteers was a woman named Sophie, and she extended her stay indefinitely. They now have two children Prunelle and Eliou, who are mischievous, but honestly really sweet kids. The farm is their playground and I have never met two kids as tough as them.

The farm itself is a chaotic, but incredible feat of engineering! It is entirely solar powered, 98% of the food is grown in the garden, there is a compost powered hot water heater, a plethora of animals, a green house, a lake, a pond, a cabin, mud-house, a couple caravans, and a bakery. The farm would run much smoother but last year there was a fire and the barn burned down. It set this family back many years and made not only a difficult winter that year but put a time crunch on getting prepared for winter this year. That is the type of work I was helping with. We were building this barn with over 20ft high walls. The walls were to be made out of glass. We had started installing the panels right before I left. Other than building the frames and walls I also helped run new electrical wires to the battery, fed the chickens, ducks, and geese, built moulds for concrete, laid a concrete path around the entire barn, herded sheep, harvested every vegetable their farm offered, and about 1.5 billion other little tasks that my host asked me to do (normally involving a chainsaw or industrial machinery; to which I cooly responded of course I know how to use). It is a crazy life to live but I would never change my days spent there: the jam sessions on weekends, the never ending battle to see how many ways we could cook zucchini and tomatoes every day for lunch, the endless supply of goat milk and cheese, the rebellion against perfection through learning by doing, the 30/30 days that I gazed at the surrounding mountains in awe on multiple occasions, the handful of times that a joke managed to translate and we all died laughing, the number of times I had to put the ducklings back into the fence because they escaped, and especially the nights we spent in the kitchen drinking coffee (or your beverage of choice) and discussing things that were greater than ourselves; hopeful to find some enlightening answer but content with simply trying. 

Possible Stockholm syndrome

In my current state of stoic reflection I am trying to put to words what I learned from my time in France. I learned patience, hard work, adaptability, and practical skills. However, the phrase that best summarizes what I learned is Understanding. We always talk about putting ourselves in other peoples shoes, but to some degree we fail because we only theoretically attempt this. I feel that I actually got to a point of what it means to understand someone. It is one of the most empathetic things I have ever done. I got to the point where I actually did feel that it was my farm. I felt the urgency of getting walls on the barn so that we could survive winter. I felt guilty not working from sunrise to sunset (with a siesta after lunch of course) because we really needed to make more progress. Somedays I would be so encompassed in my work that I would tell my host just 15 more minutes even though the sun was already down. This was either the biggest case of Stockholm syndrome or I truly began to understand the life of someone else. Even still these words don’t suffice, I actually wrote a poem to phrase it still even better, for which I will type for you now haha.

Good-Bye Mountains

goodbye perilous peaks of plight with powdered pastures perfuming passes.

goodbye hikes higher and harder; half hastened and half humbling.

goodbye tall trees timid yet tremendous, towering terrifically.

goodbye fantastically forlorn farm, feasibly feeding fathers’ faint fortunes and families.

goodbye mighty mountains; meticulously mapping my mind. making merry a month but meager and minute. marvelously majestic and magnificent in mending mal matters. motionless yet movements of mine made massive.

goodbye mountains.

Who wore it better?

Def. Me

Late night reading in the cabin. Wool socks and candle light.

Snuck a photo to describe Jean-Phil, two different shoes. I don’t even know the reason why.

Where we herd the sheep.

Some little duckies.

Cats trying to stay warm.

The wonderful night of potato chips.

Not a teacher’s hands anymore.

The sunset every day. My back yard.

Jean-Phil and Prunelle and some tasty sheep liver with zucchini wedges.