This story is about a (Willing Worker On Organic Farms), who wasn't. A Russian boy traveling the world on a dime, perhaps smart, more like dumb, but was learning a lesson. The farm was a big operation and run by women who were good farmers. The mix was oil and water and the woofer couldn't handle being told what to do by women who probably resembled his mother. I'm guessing. There was an explosion at dinner between the crowd of women workers around the table when he expressed his views of the role of women and men, but he was alone, not fully formed and unwilling in body and soul to fit in. He got as good as he gave from the women. The rule of thumb for a team is FI or FO. (Fit in or Fuck off) He had to move on. That evening he packed his suitcase and went to the gravel road to hitchhike onward. Unfortunately when a car stopped to pick him up his suitcase latch came apart and his clothing became strewn over the dusty road along with his other meagre possessions, much to the merriment of the women who saw the scrambling in the dust as just desserts. I'm not sure why this has lingered for years in my mind. It may say more about me than I care to admit. A youth not fully formed in a cadre of mature Amazons unwilling to cut any ice, even for a boy, him, unwise and petulant, humiliated in the dust, unwilling to learn and listen. I hear the unkindness of a group unwilling or unable to grant growing space to a traveler from a culture of another world that needed time to absorb the difference. I hope he found something that took him in to counteract something that shook him up. It is tough to be alone in a strange country when the chip on your shoulder is matched by everyone else.
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