OK, so clearly I have been stalling this post for quite some time now and driving you all mad wondering "What is going on with those two?"
"Have they fallen off the grid entirely, never to be seen again?"
"Are coyotes still savoring the last fleshy bits of them?"
"Do they just suck at blogging?"
Well, there is certainly some truth in that last one. Sorry. :(
But, really, the long delay in making this post is mainly the result of needing some time and perspective in order to write clearly about our great disappointment in our experience at the Solar Ark.
After all the trials and tribulations of our journey halfway across the country,
we finally arrive and set up camp at the Solar Ark:
A mere week later, here we are fleeing (if one can call it that, at 12 mph):
Let's back up just a bit, shall we, and figure out this tragedy/travesty happened. To really begin at the beginning, we have to go back a bit more than a year ago to when we first contacted Arvo, the owner of the Solar Ark.
He had placed an ad in caretaker.org for work exchangers (or "wexers", for short) to come and learn-while-doing solar, wind, water catchment, chicken poop methane production, and permaculture. During our initial phone conversation, we made it clear we were looking first-and-foremost for an opportunity to learn solar energy systems, but were basically interested in everything EXCEPT permaculture (since we felt we already had a pretty good grasp of that); Arvo made it clear that he would teach us about all the Solar Ark's systems as we helped with them, but there would be some requirement for us to help with the gardens. We assured him we would be happy to do some gardening, as part of our work responsibilities, in order to get the incredible education we were certain we would get from him about solar energy, etc.
Red Flag #1: When a person with whom you are going to work-exchange recommends-- in the initial phone conversation-- that you do a "pre-visit" or have a Plan B, and complains that the wexers they get are often lazy and cannot handle doing a little physical labor, RUN! What we do instead: smugly think of how we are totally going to knock his socks off and start making plans to go.Besides the red flag (which we only identified in hindsight), it sounded like a fair work exchange and a great opportunity, but we were not yet financially or mentally ready to take the leap-- primarily because my contract at the college was renewed, so such a leap was not yet being thrust upon us! We had told Arvo we would get in touch if and when we could give him a more solid time frame for our visit.
So, fast-forward to February of this year, when the college informed me (yes, a month before the wedding) that my contract was not going to be renewed for this fall. After the wedding fun/madness had passed, we again contacted Arvo to ask if he was still hosting work exchangers this summer, and he replied in the affirmative. We told him we were looking for an RV and would make contact again once we found one and had a reasonably certain E.T.A. at the Solar Ark.
After buying Baba G ("The Beast"), we called Arvo to let him know we could be there by late July or early August. But he insisted that "earlier was better than later"-- in fact, he made it clear that it was very important we get there by July 1st.
Red Flag #2: When someone for whom you are going to work-exchange pressures you to bump up your time schedule, JUST SAY NO! What we do instead: tell Arvo we will do our best to get there by July 1st.So, instead of taking our time and behaving like somewhat sane newlyweds about to become unemployed, completely turn our lives upside down, and move halfway across the country-- in an RV! With problems!!--, we RUSH RUSH RUSH to try to adhere to someone else's time frame. Never again.
Looking back from a survivor's perspective, I can see now (of course, Nate saw it then) how completely insane it was to try to (1) wrap up our jobs; (2) move out of our apartment; (3) move into the Bowdens'; (4) sell or donate most of our belongings, including Nate's beloved Boston Whaler "Delores";
(5) clean and repair and prepare an RV in desperate need of major TLC for an ultra-condensed version of our life with three cats (and their litter box... blech); and (6) drive away from everything and everyone we had been attached to, and off on a road trip with a steady stream of necessary repairs... in FIVE WEEKS!
To make matters worse, for nearly the whole prep phase, it rained and rained and rained some more, making us feel like we were headed for Noah's Ark, instead of the Solar Ark.
When it wasn't raining, it was threatening to rain, so we had to keep tarps and bungees at the ready at all times. Looking back, we still cannot fathom how we got everything done-- in the rain-- in a mere five weeks.
But, recall, Gentle Reader, that five weeks was nowhere near within Arvo's desired time frame for us. On the phone, when we (ok, I) had agreed to "shoot for July 1st," I was saying we would try to do all of the above in TWO WEEKS. By now, you might be wondering what the hell I was thinking.
Yeah, me too. Where were you people, when I needed an intervention?! =:-O
My best and most honest answer is that, in a year-plus of scouring the web for an opportunity like the one at the Solar Ark, I had not found anything even close. So, I was thinking that, if we couldn't hit Arvo's deadline, we might lose the whole opportunity and have a major setback before we even got started with our big plan to start a school for sustainability (more on that in a future blog).
(And why was July 1st so crucial, anyway? We never did get any solid answer from Arvo about that... and we certainly didn't find any evidence of tardiness-related disasters when we got there.)
So, I said we'd shoot for July 1st. We shot for it, all right. And missed. Several times over. And hit each other with all the misfires. :( By the time we hit the road on July 19th, we were exhausted, exasperated, and extremely grumpy. Not the way to start a once-in-a-lifetime road trip we had been referring to as our "Honeymove."
And, right up until we got there, we thought the Solar Ark was totally going to be worth it.
Let's just say, we do believe if we had gone there a few years ago, we might have had a very different experience. Back then, Arvo was teaching organized classes on solar, etc. to groups of students from a nearby community college... and getting paid for it. So (we are guessing), the whole gestalt of the Solar Ark would have been more organized, more peaceful, more financially secure, and more of a real learning experience.
But, alas, we arrived on August 1, 2013. Thank goodness a couple of fabulous college girls (majoring in permaculture/horticulture) from Arkansas arrived just after we did: we don't think we would have made it as long as we did without Olivia and Danielle!
Here is Danielle at the Farmer's Market in Chama, NM:
(How do I not have any pics of Olivia??? Olivia: send me a pic of you at the Ark so I can include it!)
Red Flag #3: When your first instinct, upon getting the full tour of the facility you intend to live and work at-- potentially for several months-- is to run back out the way you came in... RUN! What we do instead: switch ourselves into some kind of mental "safe mode" which dampens our senses a bit and allows us to get through the one week we did make it through. So, c'mon, you are probably saying to yourself: what could have been so bad?
Firstly, the greeting committee at the gate is a fleet of beat-up, non-to-semi-working vehicles:
Secondly, the non-human animals at the Ark, with the exception of one flock of truly free-range chickens, were underfed and overexploited. I have no pictures of them: it was just too sad. All the cooped hens were so stressed out, they were missing LOTS of feathers: this is a well-documented stress sign in birds. The dogs, whose job it was to guard the chickens at night, also seemed to be kept in a constant state of near-starvation, so much so that two of them got in a vicious, bloody fight that left Nate with a nasty bite mark on his calf from trying to break it up!
Thirdly, the human population of workers at the Ark was also overexploited and stressed out, though quite well-fed. One intern, John, who returned for another go after being at the Ark last year, seems to be running the place mostly single-handedly: he knows all the systems (yes, the ones we wanted to learn) very well and was pretty much in constant motion for the whole week we were there. As we already mentioned, Olivia and Danielle arrived later the same night we did, so the four of us were beginners at everything except the gardening. In other words, we did not need to learn a whole lot about the gardens, but that was the task we were assigned to, roughly 95% of our time. We had all come to learn solar, and none of us were doing anything but gardening... until Danielle confronted Arvo and basically demanded some solar lessons. You go, girl!
After a week of gardening and collecting eggs from stressed out chickens (to make money for Arvo), going mushroom hunting (which sounds lovely, doesn't it? Sadly, it was more of a forced march with shouted orders and very little education from Arvo...), impromptu moral support powwows with the girls, a couple of begrudging solar lessons, and ultimately just trying to avoid the negativity cloud that surrounds Arvo, the girls said it was time for them to be on their way back toward home... and we decided that was our cue to leave, too.
We really hope the Solar Ark makes a comeback: it has so much untapped potential and is in such a beautiful place in the high desert of northern New Mexico, that it is just heartbreaking to see it in its current state. In the mean time, though, we really hope the website will be updated (it was already supposed to be, but it has not been) to more honestly reflect the internship/work exchange opportunity, which is essentially to learn to garden using permaculture principles and to make money at farmers' markets.
Up Next: Two Fabulous Natural Home Tours!
