Back to the Big Smoke

A few pieces of sad news from home has had me a bit down the last couple of weeks. I haven’t felt homesick, but it’s frustrating being so far from those that are doing it tough. One quickly realises the limitations of text and email.

In the midst of this I had an identity crisis when I visited Denver Colorado. We were given a few days off after we finished harvesting in Julesberg Colorado. On our last day we went to Denver to do some shopping. It was the first large city that I’ve been to since arriving.

In one respect I really appreciate the diversity that you find in the city. But diversity will often entail good and bad. I managed to find a good espresso, I bought some funky boxer shorts from Gap, and wireless internet was available in a Starbucks on every street corner, but I also a saw a pedestrian hit by a car, a guy handcuffed face down on the ground in the mall and had to deal with a snobby shop attendant who couldn’t stop staring at my now heavily scuffed work boots.

As I walked around, I’d pick out the people that I thought looked like me – those that appeared to be living a similar life to the one that I was living back home. However, looking at them made me realise just how different my life, my work and company has been over the last couple of months. It also made me realise that my surrounds have changed me a bit. How I’ve changed, I’m still trying to work out. My afternoon was spent wandering around in a reflective daze.

On the other side of the coin, there’s a part of me that enjoys the simplicity of the country. There’s something safe about it. There are parameters, perhaps defined by values and tradition, that cause people to think alike. It’s easy to be accepted if you reside within these parameters, but life is a bit trickier if you’re different.

Meeting up with the boys to travel home jolted me back into country-land – there wasn’t much choice. The boys spent most of the three hour trip home playing a game called ‘Hey Cow’. This involves winding down the window and screaming at grazing cows as you pass by trying to make them look up. As funny as this was, my excursion back into the big smoke left me feeling a bit rattled. I was quite happy keeping to myself in the back of the van.

My goal on this trip is to be myself whether it fits or not. I think I’m doing OK so far. There’s no denying that I am very different to a lot of the guys on the crew. But I think there exists a mutual respect. One thing’s for sure, I could handle myself in Denver’s peak hour traffic.