Village Squire, 1977-03, Page 34P. S.
Who says the best things
in life are free?
BY KEITH ROULSTON
The old song has been brainwashing
us for years now: The Best Things in Life
are Free. I was reminded of the song
recently when I picked up one of those
weekend newspaper supplements that
featured a whole series of stories about city
people rediscovering the beauty of peace
and quiet, fresh air and the changing of the
seasons. Ah yes, such great things, and all
free or so it would seem.
One of my driving urges in lit;: has been
to get back to that kind of life too, to get
away from the materialistic life of the city
and even to a lesser extent of our towns
and villages. Back to the land, I said,
where there is as much pleasure in
watching a butterfly flit from flower to
flower as there is in the city in watching
Dirty Harry and The Dirty Dozen in a
double bill at the local movie house. Back
to where you could walk out to the garden
and pick fresh fruit and vegetables for free
that were far better than the goods you buy
and the store at an outlandish price.
Ah yes, back to my roots. It sounds so
easy, so wonderful. Little do you realize
that the hard part is just getting there.
Have you tried to find one of these little
gardens of eden recently. They're scarce as
hen's teeth, let me tell you. What with the
worry about preserving farmland, and the
problems that city people living in the
country cause for farmers (fresh air, they
think should be untainted by the aroma of
pig manure) planners are cutting down on
the number of small land holdings allowed.
Of course that means that what little
pockets are left, are in great demand.
Every weekend you can see the bright
shiny station wagons and vans driving up
and down concession roads as the
land -hungry people from the city look for a
little patch of land and an old, tumbled
down farm house that has somehow
escaped the notice of all the other would-be
back -to -the landers. They come from their
well-paid city professions with their
cheque-book at the ready and just what
hope does the local joe have if it comes to a
bidding war.
I, as usual, was born too late. I've been
plagued with it all my life, just missing out
on so many good things because I was born
a month, or a year or five years after I
should have been. Sometimes I had the
impression that Hitler caused the Second
World War just so my birth could be
delayed and I'd miss out on so many good
things. Anyway, as I said, I was born too
late when it came to getting a country
corner of peace and quiet.
Ten years ago, even five or six years ago,
there were all kinds of old country homes
for sale around here. In those days too,
there weren't many buyers because the
city people still thought this was all
wilderness out here and hadn't gotten
desperate enough in their search to get
here. Farms were still cheap too, so the
prices were ridiculously low.
But now, the price of farmland has
soared in the past three years or so, the city
people are out here by the hundreds and
there's a big fight for anything even
vaguely habitable with more than a
postage stamp sized lot around it.
Oh well, 1 shouldn't complain too much.
I guess since we did get our place in the
country a couple of years ago. The place
cost more for the old house and four acres
of land than a whole farm would have five
years earlier, but at least we got it. We've
been paying for it ever since, of course, not
only with the mortgage but through
plumber's bills, and bills for this and bills
for that. The people who owned the house
before us had done a lot of the work
modernizing the essentials in the house,
but you'd be amaxed at all the other
expences you can run up against.
Then there are fuel bills to heat the
monstrous old place, bills that would make
E.P. Taylor blanch. There's also about
three miles of land that has to be blown
open every time the fuel truck has to get in
to deliver its gold. The cost of that isn't.
pretty either.
So the good things in life definitely are
not free. On the other hand, I have paid
just about as much for a house in town with
a postage stamp lawn (in some towns a lot
more). The fuel bill isn't much higher than
if the same old house was in mid Toronto
and the lane at least gives us good exercise
in walking when we can't afford to get it
cleared. And when the spring starts to
sweep the countryside, we'll have (besides
the mud) the sweet smells, the warm fresh
air (if the nieghbour isn't spreading
manure) and the bright colours to entertain
us, all free.
Yes, the best things in life are free....it's
just finding a place to enjoy them that gets
expensive.
PG. 32. THE VILLAGE SQUIRE/MARCH, 1977.
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