Thank God I'm A Country Boy

Life on the farm is kind of laid back. The air is clean, the food is fresh from the garden or the chicken coop, and the labor is the honest, dirty, purifying kind that makes me feel as though my meals and bed have been fully earned, and without that unwelcome feeling, occasionally known to present itself in these types of situations, that it's not worth it.  I've shoveled chicken shit for compost, made bricks from mud and straw, harvested a field of tomatoes, and built a greenhouse out of bamboo.  My hands are developing calouses that I wish had been there for my embarassing turn at the corn grinder in Samibhanjyang.  My feet are tatooed with a layer of dirt that does not come off in the shower.  I'm tired in a variety of interesting muscle groups that I wasn't fully aware existed. But still, I'm pleasantly at ease, looking forward to the next day's labor.  The people I've met here have been predictably cool, full of good travel advice and interesting stories.  The time is passing without my notice and at the moment I find myself in a state of amused disbelief, having discovered that I've already been here nine days and sensing that this amount of time should feel different; perhaps longer, more like the grind of days that comes before a sheduled vacation where one ticks off the days in agony, slowing them down when you wish they'd pass faster.  But this doesn't feel like that. I'm not concerned about when the end of my labors should arive, and that surprises me a little.