| Show Farmer In A Off Far-Off Land EDITORS EDITOR'S NOTE Moritz Thomsen fought in World War II Il and then was a hog farmer for 20 years near Red Bluff California At the age of 50 SO he joined the Peace Corps and recently returned from four years of service as a Volunteer in Ecuador Ive I've just come back from several years in Ecuador where I lived and worked in ina ina ina a sea coast village as a Peace Corps Agriculture Volunteer THERE were about Volunteers in Ecuador at j i that time and my only claim Ito i ito to uniqueness is is' that I was wasa a part of that one percent of Peace Corps Volunteers who are over 50 years of age This troubled me all through my stay in South America not because I was 50 and involved with a group whose average age is 24 that part was wonderfully stimulating but because only I 1 percent of the Peace Corps is made up of my age group i iI I CAME away cc Cl winced I that the Peace Corps is simply simply simply sim sim- ply too great of an experience I Ito to be squandered mainly on the young and I was really puzzled that so few people my age have responded to the Peace Corps challenge I Let me tell you something about the hardest the most difficult part of my entire Peace Corps experience It wasn't in the lousy food that I sometimes had to eat nor northe northe northe the long stretches of infinite boredom of living in a backward backward backward back back- ward village nor the shock of trying to exist and function function function tion in a strange culture at atthe atthe atthe the village level IT WASN'T in the frustrations frustrations frus frus- frustrations I of trying to reach I people with my little bag of agricultural simplicities completely completely completely com com- revolutionary in that Bronze-Age Bronze agriculture And these were all very real problems too believe me No the hardest most difficult difficult difficult dif dif- dif dif- time was picking up the Peace Corps application at the post office filling it out and sending it off to Washington THAT APPLICATION sat on the kitchen table for weeks while I thought about it Because Because Because Be Be- cause the truth is that for the average farmer over 40 in sending in the Peace Corps application he is almost in inevitably inevitably inevitably in- in saying to himself I am going to change my way of looking at life It is a hard and terrible decision to make for any man who has been raised and lives by our American tradition that equates success success success suc suc- cess and happiness with money IT IMPLIES that until that moment he was moving in the wrong direction and this is a horrible thing to have to face when he is half halfway halfway halfway way down the road IT IS A hard and terrible decision decision decision de de- de- de because it must bedone be bedone bedone done against that natural I rigidity which begins to harden our characters and narrow our horizons and our aspirations at about the age of 40 THIS TIllS IS ONE of the sadI sad- sad nesses of growing old that I rigidity does occur and that 1 one by one the doors of possibilities which lead to new experiences slowly close and lock until ones one's sense of choice is more and more restricted restricted restricted re re- re- re and one goes on out of habit in that safe secure world one knows And this is the wonder of the Peace Corps for the older person that once you have made that frightfully difficult decision and have said no noto to simple security and no noto to the too-familiar too and no noto to the doubtful satisfactions satisfaction of being a square hole in a ai i square re peg with the future I all neatly laid out to the very end a lot in Florida where you will go when you retire or the very lot in the cemetery where you will rest forever then suddenly tho those e locked doors fly open again agam In the profoundest sort of way the whole thing is like suddenly being young again I GUESS if you say to yourself yourself yourself your your- self Oh no I dont don't want to be young again I dont don't dontI I want to have to go through all that again then Peace Corps is simply not for you for it isn't an easy exper exper- exper The difficulties are ones that to my knowledge no one has ever even mentioned they are the simple difficulties of once more being forced to see and be involved in a world orld as fresh as beautiful and as terrifying as the world you saw in your youth And you face it again with the same uncertainty and vulnerability THE THE REAL difficulties then are personal Let me go back I to my own experience I farmed for almost 20 years beginning in 1945 right after the war Admittedly I Iwas Iwas Iwas was somewhat emotionally dried up by the war and wanted only the comfortable I 1 security of farm life that i insularity which would be involved closely and mainly i with seasons the thc open fields the winter rains the hot dry summers And it was a good lt life e made challenging by all the technological changes that swept agriculture in those years SUDDENLY AFTER about I I three months of training to toi toj j i prepare me for the shock I I had been catapulted from 1 serenity into another very i real world a world in which and we yawn when we read the figures people die of hunger and malnutrition every month I guess we are all pretty much formed by our environment environment environment environ environ- ment and by whatever realities realities realities real real- are put before us and so this trus new world of hunger and deprivation was bound to change me AFTER I had been in the Peace Corps awhile I suddenly Y I realized that in all those 20 I years on my farm I had hadI cried only once and that was I when I had taken my old dog i to the vet to be put away And I thought to myself I Why that's only one more time than a dead man cries For the truth was that living among the poorest people in inthe inthe inthe I the world had made me aware of what life is really all about for most of the people in the world and man its it's the truth I learned how to cry again BUT HERE is is' is the important important important im im- im- im thing life dont don't become become become be be- come only sadder for me though of course it was but it also became more valuable more beautiful more moving I There is real beauty in the fierce pride and dignity of the very poor as they struggle struggle struggle i I gle to exist there is real beauty in a poor man when he comes to you with complete trust and says Amigo Im I'm tried of being poor show me how to change SO WHEN I say that Peace Corps will teach you how to cry again its it's not for the sadness of the world Its It's the beauty of the world and the essential dignity and strength of man to endure that makes you weep sharing his pride These are things you have to see to believe I guess what I want to say sayI I is simply that the value of the the Peace Corps experience for the older person is in its capac capacity ty to rip away all the I II I tired old ways of seeing I things and let you see life I I fresh and new like a child again in all its beauty and I j its terror FOR SOME people this j might be a gift without a aprice aprice I 4 price for some a burden too heavy to be lifted Each of us depending on what gives meaning to his I I life decides this in his heart I |
