[整理]Mr Doherty Builds His Dream Life

[整理]Mr Doherty Builds His Dream Life In America many people have a romantic idea of life in the countryside. Many living in towns dream of starting up their own farm, of living off the land. Few get round to putting their dreams into practice. This is perhaps just as well, as the life of a farmer is far from easy, as Jim Doherty discovered when he set out to combine being a writer with running a farm. Nevertheless, as he explains, he has no regrets and remains enthusiastic about his decision to change his way of life. Mr. Doherty Builds His Dream Life Jim Doherty 1. There are two things I have always wanted to do -- write and live on a farm. Today I'm doing both. I am not in E. B. White's class as a writer or in my neighbors' league(联盟) as a farmer, but I'm getting by(勉强过活). And after years of frustration(挫折)with city and suburban(郊区) living, my wife Sandy and I have finally found contentment(满足) here in the country. 2. It's a self-reliant sort of life. We grow nearly all of our fruits and vegetables. Our hens keep us in eggs, with several dozen left over to sell each week. Our bees provide us with honey, and we cut enough wood to just about make it through the heating season. 3. It's a satisfying life too. In the summer we canoe(独木舟) on the river, go picnicking in the woods and take long bicycle rides. In the winter we ski and skate. We get excited about sunsets. We love the smell of the earth warming and the sound of cattle lowing(牛鸣). We watch for hawks in the sky and deer in the cornfields. 4. But the good life can get pretty tough. Three months ago when it was 30 below, we spent two miserable(痛苦的) days hauling(拖) firewood up the river on a sled(雪橇). Three months from now, it will be 95 above and we will be cultivating corn, weeding(除草) strawberries and killing chickens. Recently, Sandy and I had to retile the back roof. Soon Jim, 16 and Emily, 13, the youngest of our four children, will help me make some long-overdue(迟到的) improvements on the outdoor toilet that supplements(补充) our indoor plumbing(管道) when we are working outside. Later this month, we'll spray(喷雾) the orchard(果园), paint the barn(谷仓), plant the garden and clean the hen house before the new chicks arrive. 5. In between such chores(琐事), I manage to spend 50 to 60 hours a week at the typewriter or doing reporting for the freelance(兼职的，自由职业的) articles I sell to magazines and newspapers. Sandy, meanwhile, pursues her own demanding (高要求的) schedule. Besides the usual household routine(例行公事), she oversees(照料) the garden and beehives(蜂箱), bakes bread, cans and freezes, drives the kids to their music lessons, practices with them, takes organ(组织) lessons on her own, does research and typing for me, writes an article herself now and then, tends the flower beds, stacks(堆积) a little wood and delivers the eggs. There is, as the old saying goes, no rest for the wicked(邪恶的) on a place like this -- and not much for the virtuous(有道德的) either. 6. None of us will ever forget our first winter. We were buried under five feet of snow from December through March. While one storm after another blasted(发出巨 响) huge drifts(趋势) up against the house and barn, we kept warm inside burning our own wood, eating our own apples and loving every minute of it. 7. When spring came, it brought two floods. First the river overflowed, covering much of our land for weeks. Then the growing season began, swamping(使 忙于应付) us under wave after wave of produce. Our freezer filled up with cherries, raspberries(覆盆子), strawberries, asparagus(芦笋), peas, beans and corn. Then our canned-goods shelves and cupboards began to grow with preserves(蜜饯), tomato juice, grape juice, plums(李子), jams and jellies. Eventually, the basement floor disappeared under piles of potatoes, squash and pumpkins, and the barn began to fill with apples and pears. It was amazing. 8. The next year we grew even more food and managed to get through the winter on firewood that was mostly from our own trees and only 100 gallons of heating oil. At that point I began thinking seriously about quitting my job and starting to freelance. The timing was terrible. By then, Shawn and Amy, our oldest girls were attending expensive Ivy League schools and we had only a few thousand dollars in the bank. Yet we kept coming back to the same question: Will there ever be a better time? The answer, decidedly, was no, and so -- with my employer's blessings and half a year's pay in accumulated benefits in my pocket -- off I went. 9. There have been a few anxious moments since then, but on balance things have gone much better than we had any right to expect. For various stories of mine, I've crawled into black-bear dens for Sports Illustrated, hitched up(拉住) dogsled racing teams for Smithsonian magazine, checked out the Lake Champlain(尚普兰) "monster" for Science Digest, and canoed through the Boundary Waters wilderness area of Minnesota for Destinations. 10. I'm not making anywhere near as much money as I did when I was employed full time, but now we don't need as much either. I generate enough income to handle our $600-a-month mortgage(按揭) payments plus the usual expenses for a family like ours. That includes everything from music lessons and dental bills to car repairs and college costs. When it comes to insurance, we have a poor man's major-medical policy. We have to pay the first $500 of any medical fees for each member of the family. It picks up 80% of the costs beyond that. Although we are stuck with paying minor expenses, our premium is low -- only $560 a year -- and we are covered against catastrophe. Aside from that and the policy on our two cars at $400 a year, we have no other insurance. But we are setting aside $2,000 a year in an IRA. 11. We've been able to make up the difference in income by cutting back without appreciably lowering our standard of living. We continue to dine out once or twice a month, but now we patronize(经常光顾) local restaurants instead of more expensive places in the city. We still attend the opera and ballet in Milwaukee but only a few times a year. We eat less meat, drink cheaper wine and see fewer movies. Extravagant(奢侈的) Christmases are a memory, and we combine vacations with story assignments... 12. I suspect not everyone who loves the country would be happy living the way we do. It takes a couple of special qualities. One is a tolerance for solitude(荒僻 的地方). Because we are so busy and on such a tight budget, we don't entertain much. During the growing season there is no time for socializing anyway. Jim and Emily are involved in school activities, but they too spend most of their time at home. 13. The other requirement is energy -- a lot of it. The way to make self-sufficiency work on a small scale is to resist the temptation to buy a tractor and other expensive laborsaving devices. Instead, you do the work yourself. The only machinery we own (not counting the lawn mower) is a little three-horsepower rotary (旋转式) cultivator and a 16-inch chain saw. 14. How much longer we'll have enough energy to stay on here is anybody's perhaps for quite a while, perhaps not. When the time comes, we'll leave with guess -- a feeling of sorrow but also with a sense of pride at what we've been able to accomplish. We should make a fair profit on the sale of the place, too. We've invested about $35,000 of our own money in it, and we could just about double that if we sold today. But this is not a good time to sell. Once economic conditions improve, however, demand for farms like ours should be strong again. 15. We didn't move here primarily to earn money though. We came because we wanted to improve the quality of our lives. When I watch Emily collecting eggs in the evening, fishing with Jim on the river or enjoying an old-fashioned picnic in the orchard with the entire family, I know we've found just what we were looking for. Content Questions 1. What are the two things that the writer has always wanted to do? 2. Why does the writer think that his life in the country is of the self-reliant type and satisfying? 3. Is life in the country easy for the writer and his family? 4. What was their first winter like? 5. What happened when the first spring came? Of the two floods the author describes, what does the second one actually refer to? 6. What decision did the writer make in the following year? 7. What does the writer have to do in order to write his stories? 8. Insurance is important to a Western family. How do the Dohertys cope with this problem? 9. How do the writer and his family manage to live on a comparatively low income in the country? 10. What does the writer think are the special qualities necessary for leading a life the way they do? 11. How does the writer think he and his family will feel when they have to leave the farm someday? 12. What did the writer and his family choose to live in the country for? Have they finally realized their dream? Points for Discussion 1. In what ways does the author think that the quality of life has improved for him and his family? 2. In your opinion, which is better, living in the country or living in the city? Give reasons.