Farmer Maggie?

We went to Aix-en-Provence this past weekend and it was so nice. And by "nice" I do not mean "Nice," although the two cities are not too far apart.

We took the TGV (fast train) from Paris, and it only took three hours. Somehow, we managed to finnagle seats on the upper floor of the train, so our view of the French countryside was really amazing. Even more amazing, perhaps, was the fact that choice seating is possible to secure even when transport is purchased on-line and no additional/ridiculous fees were paid for "select" seating. But what was most amazing was the fact that there are so many towns on the way to Provence that look to have a population of about thirty.

Well, thirty people, anyway. They also seemed to have 300 chickens, 65 cows, 40 horses, and 106 sheep. Those are estimates, by the way.

I just want to know what people DO in towns like those. They all seem to have a church, so at least their Sunday morning whereabouts are accounted for. They must have a "market day" where they all bring their various wares to a central location and make the appropriate trades so that they can all eat for the week. So there is another morning that is explained. But what about the rest of the week? Besides the requisite farming, cooking, and cleaning, I mean. Because all that toil and trouble probably alots for a 60-plus hour work week.

As I gazed out the TGV window, I started thinking about how appealing the simplicity of such a life could ostensibly be. It would be so refreshing to be removed from the modern world of constant contact. It is just not altogether necessary for there to be 17 technological avenues for people to utilise to contact one another, always with the expectation that everyone is perpetually available. I find it exhausting, this being connected all the time. And the barter system is such a GOOD system, no?

I mean how much stress could be alleviated if we all showed up on market day and made trades of our wares rather than headed to the local grocery store to dole out the Benjamins for over-priced cantaloupe and cheese that has been in pressure-sealed packaging since the Reagan administration? Why can't things just be simple and straightforward, like life on the farm?

Not to be too naive. I know that human beings, being human beings, are prone and subject to stressors no matter where they are and what their life might entail. And I imagine that droughts, floods, a tractor breaking down, or a herd of rebellious goats could all be pretty angst-filled scenarios.

And, the thing is that even though I was having a good time imagining my life on the farm, the truth is that I could never actually do it. My biggest obstacle to this life of mythical simplicity and cheese-bartering is not that I do not have the slightest idea about farming (though I don't). Nor is it the fact that I am rather selectively lazy and I feel such an attitude would not go over too well on a farm where there is work to be done.

My biggest obstacle to this life is the fact that I am not all that interesting of a person.

I imagine that after the long day of working on the land, tending to the animals, cooking, and cleaning, there is probably a little bit of down time each evening for dinner, conversing, and general socializing. This is where my problem comes in. If I spent all day with a coop of chickens and a couple of cows, I would have absolutely nothing to talk about. I need human interaction in order to drum up conversational material. Sure, I have some witty repartee stored away in the archives, but such resources would run dry after two days on the farm. And voila, I would be the mute, boring farmer.

This is what I worry about when I think of survival in a remote town of 30 people.

In my defense, I am a writer, and I need things to write about. Rather, I need people to write about. No offence to sheep, but their daily schedules do not seem to include the varied emotional snafus about which I enjoy writing.

Some people seem to have really rich, imaginative inner worlds, and they could be conversationally solvent even if living on a lily pad in the middle of a scummy pond for five years. I am not one of those people. Take J.K. Rowling, for example. Granted, she is a genius, but how on earth did she dream up all that wizard business? She could be on the farm, milking cows all day and probably conjure up thrilling tales about leprechauns and wood nymphs. Me? Not so much.

I need human interaction. I need "real" encounters with real people, in order to be able to function as a writer.

Of course, I promptly take those "real" events and distort and exaggerate them sufficiently so that I can share the deets with the 12 followers I have on this here blog.

I am a city girl. I like the city, I like the options, I like the variety. Most of all, I like all the weirdos roaming around because observing and interacting with them makes me feel better about my own special brand of weirdness.

So anyway, in Aix, we visited Paul Cezanne's atelier. Aix, by the way, is the birthplace of Cezanne and is where he lived, died, and spent most of his life. Therefore, there is quite a lot of information, honoring, and publicizing of Cezanne around the city.

His atelier, up in the hills of Provence, was completely adorable. It was a lofty studio, with looming windows and was surrounded by beautiful, if a bit unkempt, gardens. The materials he used for his still life works were all set up in there, and it felt terrifically artsy, simple, and sunny (lots of windows, as I said). There was even a row of the human skulls he liked to paint all lined up, giving that comforting homey feeling to the whole place.

Skulls, aside, I had a resurgance of that feeling I was having on the train. I decided that I could live up in the woods in such an atelier. It would be like a French Thoreau sort of thing.

Sort of.

We left the atelier, and walked back into tres posh Aix and found a cafe. We ordered some divine Sancerre and sat nibbling on olives as we drooled over the plates of others and contemplated what to order. I felt as though I was in heaven, in this outdoor cafe in Aix, and then it struck me that this whole farming thing was not going to work out. For one thing, who would make the wine?

So, whether I am boring or not no longer seems to be an issue. Glory days! However, my life in a remote village is now on hold. I like eating out way too much.