yesterday.
It came in the form of "message" on a site I don't check into every day. Although there is a link to my blog there I don't expect messages to appear very often.
The writer was kind enough to say she enjoyed reading my witterings here. Thankyou. I enjoyed reading what you had to say about yourself too. Learning you had once lived in a remote area without electricity is the sort of information about other people I always find interesting.
This morning there was an email that I wasn't sure I would get. I had written to someone on a rather remote island asking a question I was not sure could be answered. There was a delayed response this morning with apologies for not getting back to me sooner. They were in the midst of lambing. I should have thought of that!
There are only 55 people living on that island. It's Fair Isle - a tiny dot somewhere between Shetland and Norway.
And yes, I had an answer to my question. The writer also provided some other very useful information I will be able to use.
I have often found that people who do live in rather remote parts of the world can be very friendly. They haven't isolated themselves at all. Visitors? Nice to see you. Come along in. I have some work that must be done but do stay for a cuppa while I finish it.
I remember visiting a fairly remote sheep station as a child. There were six of us and another family of five - eleven altogether. We arrived unannounced, although the Senior Cat knew he would be talking to the parents about the correspondence and School of the Air classes they children were doing. We had taken our own picnic and all we wanted was permission to light a small fire in order to make tea for the adults.
What? They were horrified. Weren't we going to have a meal with them? Weren't we going to stay the night?
Next thing we children were sent off to explore with the station children - including finding a "billy cart" so that they could pull me along and keep up over the wide area of land to cover. I don't know about my parents but we children had a wonderful day.
We didn't stay the night but we had a meal with them - and toasted our own sandwiches the following day.
That is all so different from the way I sometimes have to remind my colleagues that they have not given me a vital piece of information so that I can do something to help them. It is so different from the complete lack of response to a registered letter I sent some weeks ago.
When communication is so easy it sometimes seems to become much more difficult.
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2 comments:
Our family once visited (I think unannounced) a friend of my father and his wife, who were farming in an out-of-the-way place. She had made their week's supply of bread. My sister and I, who had never smelt - let alone tasted - fresh home-made bread, ate almost all of it. I now realize she would have had to make another batch - but the memory of that feast has lasted many years (and may be why I like making bread).
Part of the problem with modern communications is that we get too many of them! Sorting wheat from chaff takes time and concentration. Because letter writing required more thought and cost and time, I think people were more careful of what they wrote and expressed themselves more clearly. (I plan to cull unneeded emails today, and tomorrow, and the next day... until I have got rid of them.)
LMcC
Some years ago we had some acres in bush for holidays. It had a tent and little more. One Easter break we went up on the Thursday evening after heavy rain. The car slipped off the greasy road and we were bogged. We made oiur way in the dark and rain without a torch back to the big house owned by major landholder. we asked if we could borrow a torch. No. We struggled back to the house of his overseer and sat on the verandah. Cold and wet. But out of the rain.. they arrived from Easter Show in Sydney sometime later. Horrified to find us there. Apparently the place was never locked. Hot food and showers, beds for five of us. Muddy clothes washed and dried. After a huge breakfast the next morning, we were taken to bogged car while overseer followed with tractor and pulled us back onto road. Both the good and bad in one night. BTW, we afterwards made sure we always had working torch and dry matches in car.
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