Sunday, September 16, 2012

Mudsouri School of Journalism

I'm working on long-form story about people who are living an off-the-grid lifestyle. This will take me off the grid for three upcoming weekends. Today was my first day of immersion.

My hosts were kind and welcoming and the conversation was pleasant. I told them that I wanted to participate in the activities that they had planned for the day. This got me four hours of applying mud plaster to a hay bale wall (with a lunch break in between).

I got mud on my clothes and skin, in my hair and eyes, and on the wall too. When I had the urge to pee, I went to the outhouse where my waste went into a compost bucket and the informational sign on the door directed me to add a few scoops of sawdust. I washed my hands under a thin stream of water that flowed from a spigot at the bottom of a bucket. For lunch, I ate mushrooms that my hosts had grown as well as store-bought foods.

When the day's work was done, I scraped the mud off my arms and I bid my hosts farewell until Saturday.

More to come ...


2 comments:

  1. Put the hay into the form of a bale or I will have to come and bail you out of homonym jail.

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