Rural Bliss

 A 5:30am wake-up call on a frosty, -2 degrees, winter morning is tough. REALLY tough... Plucking up the courage to escape your cosy warm cocoon, put your bare feet onto a freezing cold tile floor, and sprint to the bathroom to get dressed, takes about 10 minutes every morning. Pulling on layers upon layers of mis-matching, holey, winter clothes (cows really don't care what you wear), and rummaging around for gloves and a beanie - such is my  preparation every morning for the exodus to the dairy, where my 150 buxom bovines await their morning milking session.

You may be thinking right now that I'm crazy. Why on earth would I leave my cushy corporate job in the big city for dairy farming, one of the toughest professions out there (especially for a woman)? Well, I came up with quite a few reasons that might sway you towards my idea of paradise:

1) Traffic for me every morning at 6am consists of a couple of dirt speed bumps, a resident duiker that I have to dodge on the same corner every day, a couple of milk trucks, and possibly a rogue cow or two. The 6km trip from my house to my workplace takes me a full 10 minutes. No traffic lights. No Hawkers. No taxis.

2) Have you ever seen a midlands sunrise? Enough said.

3) My daily workout happens naturally, for free, mahala - no gym fees (or those ridiculous bunnies to have to look at, *cringe*).

4) My office is very open plan - I do inventory by walking through green fields in the sunshine, visiting my dry cows (several which you can actually give a good hug), and assisting with calvings. In summer, lunch breaks are spent swimming in dams, fishing, playing with my dogs, and cycling. It's tough.

5) We never run out of milk. Ever.

6) A trip into the closest town is rather a social affair. Accounts at every shop ensure that everyone knows your name and has a meaningful conversation with you, asking about the cows, the weather, the cutest nephew in the world - real things.

7) Living close to my family. My parents are my bosses/colleagues (ideal), and my sister also lives on the farm, meaning anytime access to the cutest nephew in the world (even more ideal).

8) The Drakensberg is less than 2 hours away, as is the sea.

9) Growing my own Vegetables, or rather, trying to.

10) Having a gazillion pets and a garden big enough to not have to worry about them.

11) Domestic Worker. Garden Girl.

12) My computer is now a recreational object, purely used for emails, facebook and blogging. I no longer have to be concerned about getting some rare disease from staring at it all day.

13) The smell of fresh silage being made in Autumn.

14) Sitting on the veranda in the evenings, sipping wine and gazing at a sky full of stars - in absolute silence, only broken by the occasional jackal call or owl.

15) Bird and game watching during work hours.

and finally....

16) Gumboots and cow pats.

So, I think it was a pretty reasonable trade. Large, busy, smokey, noisy, trafficky city life, VS rural isolation, mismatched outfits, cow dung, snow and run-away fires.... its a no brainer for me ;-)