Post #8: The literal writing on the literal wall

All across the walls of the bedroom of the trailer, there was written evidence of lives that had passed through there before me. Untraceable poems of striking beauty, drawing of bees and beets, a Walt Whitman quote, a pencil sketch of a tree, illegible signatures, careful spiral designs, first names and dates of stays all lined the surfaces of the bedroom walls.

When I first arrived on the farm and got settled into my trailer, one of the first things I did was read the entries left behind by past farm workers, wwoofers, and guests. Many of them were filled with detailed accounts of their time on the farm, while others were short and simple. Not knowing my host or the area well, it was very comforting to see that other people had come and gone through the trailer. One of the first thoughts that went through my mind at that time was what I might leave behind as my entry, how I’d cement my legacy as an inhabitant of that specific trailer in that specific place in time.

There was something oddly intimate about sharing that living space with people I will probably never meet. After some time, I began to feel connected with these people that, for whatever reason, found their way to the exact same spot as me, at a different time. I just think it’s interesting that our paths crossed in space, but not time.

The entries spanned more than a decade, with the earliest one being time stamped in 2009. Some years had multiple entries, others had none. Between the people’s departing quotes, doodles, poems, and journal entries and my host’s occasional corresponding stories about those people, I was able to weave a history of the farm through the perspective of all the different people that had lived in that trailer.

When going to bed or waking up, I would often catch a glimpse of something on the wall and think about the people that had left them. I’d wonder what was going on in their lives, what was going on in the world when they were staying here, and where they are now.

When I was getting ready to depart, I gave a lot of thought to what I would contribute to the walls for future inhabitants. I eventually settled on a quote and a personal note with the approximate dates of my stay at the bottom. If you want to know what it says, you can go stay in the trailer yourself.

I like to think about the future occupants of that trailer, what they’ll think of the people that came before them, and what they’ll leave for the people after them.