Why everyone should live on a farm
City slickers often romanticise the country life.
So often you’ll find that those who live in the city glorify farm life and what they refer to as “the simple life”. But it’s not like that, not really. Farm life can be hard and it takes a lot of blood, sweat and tears to make your farm a success.
And that’s why everyone who’s spent their life in the big city should spend at least three months living on a farm. And no, not just for a holiday to escape the hustle and bustle. Here’s why:
You’re forced to be the early bird
So, you think that getting up at 6 to get to work by 8 is a big deal? Try getting up at sunrise and putting in a little hard labour before you even sit down for breakfast. Life in the city is fast-paced and they don’t call it the “daily grind” for nothing, but farm life is a different kind of hard work. Three months on a farm and you’ll truly understand what they mean when they say that the early bird catches the worm. Waking up earlier doesn’t mean you give up a good night’s sleep, it means that you go to sleep a lot earlier at night. Being a night owl has very little place on a farm. Three months of living like this will completely change the way you feel about daylight hours.
Everything is simply healthier on a farm
Never underestimate the healing power of fresh air. Forget the fumes of streets packed with cars or the air conditioned office that you spend your life in. When it comes to “getting a bit of air”, this is the real deal. You’ll also find that you eat a lot healthier out there. You can’t just stop on your way home for some takeout and, after a long day out in the sun, a microwave meal just won’t do the trick. Plus, being out on the farm all day is so much better than a hectic gym session.
There’s no such thing as instant gratification
Forget grabbing a cup of coffee on your way to work. Forget picking up a muffin from that quaint bakery down the road. Forget sitting at a desk checking your Twitter for your daily news. You have to work for anything you want on a farm. You’ll probably have internet access (it is 2015, after all), but you won’t be sitting at a desk with the time to spend on social media.
You learn the real value of a hard day’s work
Of course, you work hard in the city. In fact, people say that city folk work too hard. But it’s not the same kind of labour that you’ll find out on the farm. You reap what you sow out there. You’re not working for “the man” and you won’t find yourself sitting in three hour meetings discussing “the bottom line”. You’ll be out there – whether you’re doing some manual labour or just walking around checking that everything that needs to get done is getting done.
While this experience may not be exactly what you expected, you may find you walk away with a different attitude. Whether you enjoyed yourself or not, you’ll definitely have learned a thing or two about “country life” and possibly about yourself. You never know, you may find yourself applying for agricultural finance at the end of your three months.