Blot on the Landscape

Shortly after I bought my farm around 5 years ago I commissioned a Company to build me an indoor toilet and bathroom off from the bedroom. As my farm is remote and far away from a town this project necessitated that they bring all required equipment and camp down here for the duration of the project.

It took them about a week to construct and it happened during one of my absences.

Unfortunately.

They charged me what seemed like an arm and a leg and it came to be known by me, "As the world's worst bathroom".

It would take me a few thousand words to describe its shortcomings so suffice to say it is 'wild and wooly'; but marginally better than having to find the thunderbox in the middle of a moonless icy night or on an early morning.

I still dream of having a 'real bathroom' with no drafts to let in icy or hot desert winds.

But poverty and lack of capital funds for development have necessitated that I endure this poor attempt at bathroom construction.

I have been living not quite in third world conditions but what many of you would certainly call 'uncivilized'. Some people actually do call it quaint or 'the simple life'. I have endured icy winters without walls that reach all the way to the roof, a roof that leaks during rainfall and a farm that also has very limited water supplies and insufficient electricity to drive gadgets that require more than 600 watts to run. And this is not to mention the various wild animals that also considered what I call 'base-camp' to be also their home.

Nonetheless it is where I call home; the Land that owns me. How it claimed me is yet another story that I most likely will tell you all one day.

These two men (the aforementioned Company) who made the room that vaguely resembles a bathroom came to be unaffectionately known as the 'dodgy brothers'.

When I returned to the farm after their 'constructive visit' there were two piles of old building rubble dumped unceremoniously into the middle of the beauty and peace of the paddock; a mammoth blot imposed onto my landscape.

On limited funds and with limited building acumen I managed, over the years to beautify and better my lot somewhat. The odd WWOOFA made welcome and useful company too.

But always this awful blot on my landscape stared at me to make me feel crippled. The mounds of rubble so often overwhelmed and depressed me.

It would cost a large sum of money to have them removed or dug into a big hole and buried. Digging a hole with spades is a job way too large for me or even for an army of WWOOFAs. Digging the soil in these parts is a major undertaking that befits only the strongest and most resilient of testosterone aided persons and even then the time the soil can be dug into with spades is in a small window of time just after the winter rains.

This weekend I have had visits from a couple of my 'bestest' friends. During a brainstorming session regarding the 'rubble' an idea collectively emerged that as it could not be moved easily perhaps it could be transformed into a piece of art or beauty. One of testosterone aided friends proceeded to cover over the rubble with hay from the newly mown paddock onto which he then placed many of the fallen down tree branches and twigs from around the place. And now they look like two mounds of kindling and bush wood put into a pile for future use. No hint of building rubble can now be seen.

We also had an idea of sowing some spectacular desert wildflower daisies next May so that it can then become a striking and beautiful feature. The mounds have now been named the 'Little Sisters'.

How much more harmonious and beautiful the view now looks. Those piles that were for so long just piles of building waste and rubble that so easily could serve to depress and overwhelm me for nearly five years suddenly and, as if by magic been transformed. It leaves me wondering how such a simple and inexpensive idea never occurred to me or any of my visitors before now.

Keep posted.