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greenstormI often forget that something like a bush partner isn't part of everyone's working life. Doing outdoor work in landscaping or forestry you often end up paired off with a particular person for the duration of a job or a season. The two of you drive to site together, work together, drive home together. There's definitely technical talk and silence. There's also a very specific kind of companionship that comes from achieving shared goals, and lots of time for all kinds of conversation.
There's an art to these relationships. It's unbearable to be with someone who expects immediate constant responses for eight to ten hours every day. It's challenging to be with someone who doesn't talk at all. Low-level landscapers and foresters aren't known for their interpersonal skills but pretty much everyone I've been paired with has some way through what is essentially a very intimate relationship. Some people pour themselves out immediately and then can rest. Others barely dip their toes in with small-talk until they know it's safe and then inch in millimeter by millimeter. On any given day, depending on mood and energy and a million other things, "are you doing anything this weekend?" might lead to a discussion of instant pots, the place of old growth forests in society, hydraulics on mountain bikes, parental trauma, or just a shrug and a comfortable silence.
Your bush partner doesn't owe you much. They need to show up, be pretty well prepared ideally, and have or be able to learn or teach some skills. When you're using your body day after day there will always be slow days and fast days. There will always be days of conversation and days without and whether you read those as brooding or tired or lost in daydreams you may never get an explanation. Over time the two of you will develop your complementary skills, will settle into unspoken and efficient routines. Usually someone will lead some things and someone else will lead others: she usually puts music on, I usually call lunchtime. When we get to the worksite I automatically get these tools ready, you automatically go pee in the bushes then unload the quad.
I've been in the bush a couple days a week over the last little while and I didn't know how much I missed this kind of relationship. This is how I like humans: not rushed, using skills they've honed, working together, taking their time to learn each other, not trying to find a place to fit into each others' lives but just there for awhile and with the knowledge that there is a way out if needed. I like the daily things: tired today, doctor's appointment tomorrow, maybe I'll do this or that tonight. I like the deeper things to have the space of routine and alternate activities around them: you run that tape measure out fifteen meters or dodge those potholes while you think of an answer, there's no hurry at all. I like fitting skill-to-skill, problem solving together: I'll comb through the map and you drive through the dodgy road, I'll do the heavy work if you'll catch the details. I like not having to worry about interrupting heavy thought-work. I like having shared experiences, like rain or bugs or a particularly lovely view. I like it. I'd missed it.
It's letting me have positive regard for humans again. I think a lot of people lost that during covid and have still lost it. It's an important part of me. Being able to just be around someone without a relationship agenda of some kind really helps this (and I mean small-r relationship, that is, any interpersonal interaction of any kind is secondary to getting the work done).
Don't get me wrong, working in the bush is spectacular for so many reasons. It's great to be outside, to see things no one else gets to see, to do force-times-distance type work with my body, to experience ecosystems, to get information other folks don't have. But. It's also a good kind of getting to know someone that isn't fraught.
Things that aren't fraught are important right now.
This is something I'd lose doing remote-only work. I'm too slow in the bush to do production work -- that is, to do the basic and most common types of work out there. That leaves checking on the production folks or doing weird fringe things. Hm.
Well, it's still early evening but I'm very tired. Time to sleep. Be well.
There's an art to these relationships. It's unbearable to be with someone who expects immediate constant responses for eight to ten hours every day. It's challenging to be with someone who doesn't talk at all. Low-level landscapers and foresters aren't known for their interpersonal skills but pretty much everyone I've been paired with has some way through what is essentially a very intimate relationship. Some people pour themselves out immediately and then can rest. Others barely dip their toes in with small-talk until they know it's safe and then inch in millimeter by millimeter. On any given day, depending on mood and energy and a million other things, "are you doing anything this weekend?" might lead to a discussion of instant pots, the place of old growth forests in society, hydraulics on mountain bikes, parental trauma, or just a shrug and a comfortable silence.
Your bush partner doesn't owe you much. They need to show up, be pretty well prepared ideally, and have or be able to learn or teach some skills. When you're using your body day after day there will always be slow days and fast days. There will always be days of conversation and days without and whether you read those as brooding or tired or lost in daydreams you may never get an explanation. Over time the two of you will develop your complementary skills, will settle into unspoken and efficient routines. Usually someone will lead some things and someone else will lead others: she usually puts music on, I usually call lunchtime. When we get to the worksite I automatically get these tools ready, you automatically go pee in the bushes then unload the quad.
I've been in the bush a couple days a week over the last little while and I didn't know how much I missed this kind of relationship. This is how I like humans: not rushed, using skills they've honed, working together, taking their time to learn each other, not trying to find a place to fit into each others' lives but just there for awhile and with the knowledge that there is a way out if needed. I like the daily things: tired today, doctor's appointment tomorrow, maybe I'll do this or that tonight. I like the deeper things to have the space of routine and alternate activities around them: you run that tape measure out fifteen meters or dodge those potholes while you think of an answer, there's no hurry at all. I like fitting skill-to-skill, problem solving together: I'll comb through the map and you drive through the dodgy road, I'll do the heavy work if you'll catch the details. I like not having to worry about interrupting heavy thought-work. I like having shared experiences, like rain or bugs or a particularly lovely view. I like it. I'd missed it.
It's letting me have positive regard for humans again. I think a lot of people lost that during covid and have still lost it. It's an important part of me. Being able to just be around someone without a relationship agenda of some kind really helps this (and I mean small-r relationship, that is, any interpersonal interaction of any kind is secondary to getting the work done).
Don't get me wrong, working in the bush is spectacular for so many reasons. It's great to be outside, to see things no one else gets to see, to do force-times-distance type work with my body, to experience ecosystems, to get information other folks don't have. But. It's also a good kind of getting to know someone that isn't fraught.
Things that aren't fraught are important right now.
This is something I'd lose doing remote-only work. I'm too slow in the bush to do production work -- that is, to do the basic and most common types of work out there. That leaves checking on the production folks or doing weird fringe things. Hm.
Well, it's still early evening but I'm very tired. Time to sleep. Be well.
no subject
Date: 2021-09-18 06:39 am (UTC)