Ready. Set. Go.

As my first WWOOFing experience, The Old Oak Homestead has definitely eased me into the gardening venture and farming life. It's a small property (about 5 acres), and there isn't too much responsibility which allows for a lot of personal time and exploration.

The ordinary day starts around 9am, but this only involves the WWOOFer's coming together in the small outdoor kitchen to enjoy some coffee, tea, and maybe some breakfast. If we're lucky... there's a crossword... We get a little obsessive with the NYT crossword. Then it's off for a couple hours of work- sometimes gardening, watering, collecting, other times drying out veggies, tending to the chickens, or weeding the pretty overgrown garden. It's never much work, but it keeps us busy enough, most of the time. When it gets too hot out, it's free time. Yep, we pretty much have the afternoon to ourselves. We go into town sometimes, swim in the neighbor's lake to cool off (paddle boating is a must), and i've been making time for my art projects. Then, after some dinner, it's back into the garden for some nightwork, where it's cool enough to stay for awhile. Working depends on us, and what we feel up to. Yep, it's THAT laid-back. Not gonna lie, sometimes I want more work! But, I have the rest of my travels for that, so right now I'm just enjoying what I can!

Barbara the owner deserves her own little paragraph. This 64-year-old woman is brash, skittish, and just plain crazy- in all the best ways possible. Her mind is full of ideas, but she can never keep up with all of them, and her sentences and directions are always made up of AT LEAST 3 or more thoughts. It's almost a challenge to keep her on task. She wakes up in the late afternoon, and emerges towards nighttime, becoming a very mysterious figure to us WWOOFers, but everytime we interact it's just pure entertainment. She won the Academy Award for best documentary in '92 for her directing of "The Panama Deception," and, now a part of the Academy herself, she has the largest collection of films I have ever seen. Producers send her free copies of movies every award season for her consideration and judgement. And we have full access to her amazing library. (Zander, you would love it.)

Let's end on a cheesy note, huh? Days are passing by quickly, and soon it will be time to leave. I'm thankful to be working with great people (Matt, Katie, Tiffany, and Olivia, yep it's you guys), and I'll be sad to leave them! I feel like I just got here. But, it's also a great realization that I get to meet more and more like-minded, fun, and genuine people for the next year or two of my life. So, once again, here is to the start of something new.