One word? When seven would do…

Today we were to Pete’s parents as they had some ‘jobs’ for us to do. They are really nice folk, slightly bewildered at what has happened to their farm after they split it three ways between the three sons and ‘retired’ from it and slightly saddened that none of the family closeness they grew up with has continued into this next generation. Oh and very worried about how hard Pete and Emma work for so little financial gain and the rather dodgy welfare of the animals here because they just don’t have enough time or money to look after them properly 🙁

First thing we fed the animals, tried to coax a poorly veal calf to it’s feet and failed, caught all the ducks and took them into the pen in the field Ady and Scarlett built yesterday then we headed over there. Davies has not been feeling well since yesterday and he’s been a bit quiet and pale today 🙁 . We had a cup of tea with Pete’s parents and then headed off with his Dad into the field with shovels. They have set up a drainage system in the field to capture all the water to go into the ditches around the edges and fill concrete troughs for the animals as there is no plumbing there to save them having to bring water in. The system was put in about 35 years ago by Pete’s grandad when he was still the farmer and back then would have been dug out twice a year to keep it running. As Pete’s Dad – Roy – was telling us today back then a farmer would have been out every day mending a fence or clearing a ditch or fixing a gate somewhere on his land, in addition to looking after his animals, thus keeping on top of it. This hasn’t been done for about 6 years and so it totally blocked up and flooded.

The job was clearing the clay, soil and silt-y water away from the two areas of drain and digging the ditches deeper, while standing in knee high mud in the rain. Not terribly fun 🙁 We managed to do two, which included climbing over a barbed wire fence, getting covered to waist height in mud, soaked with rain and splashed with more mud, Roy lost his welly and we had to dig it out then practically haul him back over the fence as he has a replacement hip and is 67. I was close to useless really as not able to do much in the way of digging but getting just as wet and muddy as the men.

We went back for lunch where Ady had to strip off in the utility room and was given a shirt (was Roy’s but wrong size bought so 15 inch collar (Ady is 16.5) that barely buttoned up and a pair of their youngest (fattest) son Timothy’s trousers that don’t fit him anymore which Scarlett could have climbed into with Ady they were so big. Coupled with the fetching mud splatters on his face and head he has probably never been more gorgeous 😆 😆 The kids had spent the morning doing some painting, watching some TV and eating lots of junk food that Pete’s Mum – Brenda had kept bringing them out; crisps, sweets, chocolates :rolls:

After lunch the kids had to come with us as Brenda was going out and Roy just showed us where 3 more blocked drains were and then had to go back to work – he drives a school bus. As the kids looked utterly miserable in the back seat of the car with a 3 hour afternoon just sitting there watching us ahead of them, Ady and I were slipping about in the mud, still wet and cold from the morning and with the prospect of at least one more day of the same, possibly two (technically we’d work Friday and Saturday) and the only other potenial job mentioned was Roy driving Ady around in the bucket of the tractor up high so he could chainsaw off overhanging tree branches, the rain started again.

I decided enough was enough, had a complete tantrum about it all, sat in the car crying and then put to everyone my suggestion that we call it a day and move on early to Jill’s. The kids were instantly in agreement – in fairness they asked to only do two weeks here and agreed to stay longer when we came up with plans to split up and work in pairs but we only managed that on the first day this week. Ady took longer to persuade; he is really keen to finish what he starts and has something of a personal endurance test type mentality to the more challenging hosts, getting a kick out of saying he saw it through. I explained my reasoning that we didn’t leave our lives behind back home to sacrifice all sorts of things to dig ditches in the rain, I was very concerned about the safety aspect of the chainsawing plan and the kids were gaining nothing from sitting in a house watching TV or sitting in the back of the car watching us work like idiots. I have always known we would encounter difficult tasks and testing hosts but if the work is relevant to what we want to do ourselves and we are learning something then I am prepared to do it; like at Steward Wood when I did indeed carry loads of wood up and down hills because I could see a point to it. He was persuaded 🙂

So we went back to the farm and explained we’d been rained off, made them laugh with tales from the morning and the crazy lunchtime attire for Ady, then Ady went to clean the car out from our muddy clothing and I finished a paperwork job I had started yesterday for them. We’d debated what reason to give for leaving early. I felt we either came clean which could offend, or have them try to find us something else to do, neither of which appealed or we could come up with an excuse. As Pete and Emma are not actually WWOOFing hosts and we have been their first taste of WWOOFers it would possibly have been better to be honest and explain that we didn’t feel work like that was a fair exchange for a space to park Willow in their field and some reheated pasties they didn’t sell at market today for dinner and if we were leaving *really* early I may well have done so but we have already been upfront about the fact that most WWOOFer wouldn’t work the sort of 11 or 12 hour days we are doing but that we are prepared to because a) we are learning so much and b) they are working them alongside us so it’s a genuine reflection of their job rather than us being used as slave labour. But we already know we don’t want to be farmers as such, we have given up a lot to realise a dream this year and the kids being bored while we slog our guts out is not part of that dream and I am very conscious of our physical fitness not being up to that sort of task as nearly 40 and nearly 50 and I don’t want to put our health or safety at risk – either long term or to put us out of action for subsequent hosts. An injury picked up today digging a ditch or chainsawing tomorrow could seriously jeopardise the next month or two’s worth of planned hosts and I’m not prepared to take those sorts of risks. An 18 year old wanting to be a farmer or finding a cheap way of travelling the UK may well be totally up for such jobs though.

I hope all the hosts I have been arranging with have understood that Davies & Scarlett are part of our plan, that we are not spring chickens happy to graft for 8 hours a day in exchange for a bed and grub but are genuinely expecting something more in return for our manpower. It would be too easy to feel obliged to do the jobs and we left our lives behind because we wanted to be freer, not *more* incarcarated!

So I took an imaginary phone call from my Dad regarding the tenants, who incidentally have not paid on time AGAIN! (Due on 1st May, they paid in the office today – fuckers! which likely scuppers my birthday present plans for Ady unless the agent gets the money turned around very quickly and in our account) and said that we were going to leave tomorrow to go to our next host via home to visit the house and speak to the tenants about the rent getting paid on time in future. I said we wouldn’t have gone if we were letting them down with a market or something but as we were just doing odd jobs now I hoped they understood. They were fine and I am sure we will be waved off tomorrow with well wishes and open invitations to return as in exhange for a huge amount of experience and knowledge sharing and teaching we have put in some very long hours, been willing and hardworking and really sold them on the idea of WWOOFers. I really do wish them well and think they are lovely people, if rather misguided and chasing their tails constantly.

After dinner we went back to the van and I rang Jill who is delighted at the prospect of us arriving tomorrow as Johnny (her husband) is home for the weekend and was sad about missing us arriving on Monday after he’s gone again so will be really pleased to have us there. We’re taking a smaller cottage with a double bed and sofa bed (but it does have a bath!!!) for the weekend as they are full, then moving to a bigger cottage on Monday.

When we were first planning this our initial idea was to work for 6 weeks then have 1 off at a campsite. Financially I suspect that won’t make sense although we do have a couple of empty weeks pencilled in to the diary, but staying at Jill’s again four weeks on will be a good compromise and restorer for us.