Saturday, October 31, 2020

Hello Europe

Gifts from the fantastic camera on my new phone (graduation gift)

I was considering calling this post “Hello Geneva” after my older post “Hello Shanghai” (when I moved to Shanghai), but I’m not really living in Geneva. And when you’re living in one European country, you’re basically living in all of them anyway.

Layover in Amsterdam. Watching the sun rise over the land of my ancestors 🙏

I’ve switched continents again and am getting acclimatized to those typical new-continent things (ie. French keyboards that switch the Y and the Z. So frustrating). This time, I’ve accepted a traineeship at the ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross). I actually applied for this job back in February but forgot about it during the oncoming COVID mania, treeplanting, finishing my MA (subtle brag – I’m kinda proud of this one), and backpacking around Vancouver Island. IT TURNS OUT the ICRC can still hire internationally because they’re an essential international organization. I don’t have the exact details, but got an impression of “We’re the Red Cross – pandemic or not, if we go down, so does a whole lot of armed violence worldwide.” They even hired me despite me failing to wake up on time for the interview (time zone mistake). But the interview went well and we all seemed to “click” pretty well. Next thing I knew, I was moving to Switzerland for the year!

My fabulous manager leaving his book "When Machines do Everything" in his place when he's out of office. Get it? A machine is doing his job...

But I’m actually living in France in a tiny town called Saint Genis. It’s about a 20-minute walk to the Swiss border and a 1-hour bus ride or 45min bike ride to the ICRC in Geneva. The border is essentially non-existent; there are buildings and I’ve heard rumours that border guards do occasionally come out of them, but I haven’t seen one yet. I’ll update if that changes. Apparently, there was a brief moment during the height of COVID when the border was actually closed, which was a stark reminder to many that these are in fact two separate countries.

French hedges (as opposed to Swiss hedges, which are less... this)

So I am a frontalier  - a cross-border worker. This is mostly because Geneva is really bloody expensive – the second most expensive city in Europe actually. After Zurich. Friggin Switzerland. A fellow intern commented, “I’ve come to the realization that a moderately priced meal is anything under 70 francs” (which is roughly $100). On an intern’s salary, this will not do. Thankfully, it’s significantly cheaper to live in France than in Switzerland – like, thousands of dollars cheaper. The paperwork’s more complicated, but finding wonderfully welcoming friends with a spare room and no interest in paperwork can alleviate this. Also, this small French town next to the countryside is wonderfully breathable compared to rich-and-stuffy Geneva.

Here's some beautiful photos of said rich-and-stuffy Geneva:


Old Town


This is Abbie. We do shit together.


Lovely old church in Old Town
This one's actually in Ferney, France

💃💃💃

CHEESE, BREAD, AND CHOCOLATE. Ahh there is the most abundant selection of all three at remarkable prices (here in Saint Genis – not Geneva). In the Carrefour (France’s version of a Food Basics or Zehrs), imagine an entire aisle lined with cheese on both sides! And what a selection of blue cheeses – I could try a new one every week and not finish until the end of my year here. Of course, my town has multiple boulangeries (bread shops), a fromagerie (cheese shop), a chocolatier (guess), and a patisserie (pastry shop). Wonderbread does not exist.

HOWEVER, I have to say, there seems to be a slight drawback of all the delicious boulangeries and patisseries. These shops must have to order their ingredients from fancy places because the baking section of the grocery store is sorely lacking. It’s about one-tenth the size of the cheese section and mostly contains cake decorating supplies. I also couldn’t find vanilla extract but a did find a surprising amount of raw vanilla bean, vanilla sugar, and tiny vials of vanilla-flavoured bourbon. After re-converting the oven in my house from an extra storage space for plates into an actual oven, I managed to make a tasty apple crisp from all the wild apples growing everywhere. The apples are, ironically, called “Reignette du Canada” or, colloquially, “pomme du Canada” (transl. Canadian apple) but it’s actually an older French cultivar that pretty much only grows in France.

I have started a cheese list of ones I’ve tried and ones I hope to try.
Oof the way this camera captures the light on the paper and the wooden table...

A cool fact I’ve learned about French cheeses is the policies in place designating the origin of traditional specialties. No longer does “AOC” only refer to Alexandria Ocasio Cortez; it also refers to “Appelation d’Origine Controlee.” All AOC products are made in their traditional locations following traditional methods with traditional ingredients. And the regions are very proud of their AOCs. Apparently, wine AOCs are an even bigger deal, but whatever - cheese is better than wine anyway.

Apples, blue cheese, and honey - slowly becoming more European!

💃💃💃


There are a few little things I have to get used to (aside from the bloody Y and Z switch on my work laptop’s French keyboard). For example, I’m used to waiting to cross the street until there’s enough room to run across between cars. Here, it seems like everyone stops for you whether crossing or not. It’s strange overcoming a guilty feeling that I’m cutting someone off by just walking across but, alas, they will stop anyway and probably get annoyed if I wait for them.

Apple-picking buddy

Funky birdboxes built into barns

This camera can catch BEES

💃💃💃

Banking is such a pain! Warning: this paragraph will be long, sarcastic, and grumpy. It took multiple trips to sort out my bus pass but at least that was able to sort out; opening a Swiss bank account is a complex ball game and half of it depends on which bankers you talk to. With COVID, you need to book an appointment online rather than just show up (understandably). The first time I call the bank where I want to open an account, they tell me I can’t open I bank account unless I give proof of residence in Switzerland, or a French tax number if I’m living in France. Terrified that I’ll have to either register for taxes in France or move to Geneva, I start researching French taxes and exclusions for frontaliers. In exasperation, I message the ICRC Associates WhatsApp group. Their response: there are two locations of a particular bank where previous ICRC interns reported opening accounts with just their passport and copy of their ICRC contract. I try to book an appointment but don’t receive the confirmation so I rebook at the other location. No confirmation. I’m not going to traipse all the way to the bank for an unconfirmed appointment, so I call the local branch.

Now let’s have a moment dedicated to European bureaucracy. We exchange pleasantries in French, but when I ask to communicate in English (I’m mean c’mon, banking is serious and I don’t want to risk my poor French), she immediately responds in clear Standard English “No, sorry, this is a French-only line, but I can give you the number of the English line.” Sure. She gives me the number. I call. The man who answers the line has a thick German accent – the English line is based in Zurich. I have Geneva-specific questions, so he puts me on hold while he calls to check with the local branch I had just called. Questions answered, he asks what time would work best for the appointment. I respond, and he puts me on hold again so he can confirm with that local branch again. Appointment booked (thank God). Two hours later, I get a call from the local Geneva branch asking, completely in English, to change the appointment time. Sure. I just want that appointment and I want it in English so I know what I’m signing for. Jesus bloody Christ.

OKAY back to nice things. THERE IS AN AUTOMATED COW in Saint Genis. Fresh daily milk from a tap, just remember to BYOB (bring your own bottle).

Automated cow

💃💃💃


Silly Anneke Moment Turned Into Adventure: During Week Two, when I was feeling pretty comfortable with my route to and from work, I let myself fall asleep on the bus and woke up in a completely different place. Luckily, it was still within the zone I’d downloaded in offline Google Maps so I just wandered through the Swiss (lol I didn’t even make it to France) countryside for a bit until I reach where I’d started again. On the journey, though, I passed around the World Health Organization; fascinating to think how central this organization has been throughout this entire pandemic while walking around it (it’s very large – lots of time to think about this while walking around).

Stumbling upon the WHO, the centre of all this madness...

💃💃💃


Silly Anneke Moment Turned Educational: I went to a café while working from home one day (living with a family with a baby can be less-than-quiet). This meant gasp speaking in French with an actual French person! The woman who owns the café is very kind and often helps foreigners with their French, but there’s still the minor anxiety of “I’m about to immerse myself in a language that no my own,” which feels kinda like trespassing on someone else’s property/language while also being very bad at it. That doesn’t make much sense but neither does the anxiety really.

So I enter the café. I’m the only customer (thank God). We greet each other but I don’t catch what she says except “voulais.” S’all good – probably asking what I want.

“Une café au lait, s’il vous plait.”

She responds with something else I don’t catch while gesturing to the chairs. I discard the second phrase I’d been mentally repeating to myself (“est-ce qu’il y a une table a la bas?”) since the café is empty. I sit down. All goes well, the coffee arrives, and smiles all around. Time to ask for the wifi password.

“Es-ce que je peux aller au l’internet?”

She starts gesturing and describing the way somewhere so I follow, only to realize she’s directing me to the washroom. (Anneke mumbling “l’internet” sounds a lot like “le toilet”).

“Non… le… l’internet… le wifi? …Le wifi?” I stumble my way around.

“Ahh le mot de passe?” she laughs.

“Oui,” I breathe a sigh of relief, the not-actually-traumatic trauma passed. She follows me back to my laptop and spells out the password in English. Fifteenish minutes later, I consider asking for the password again to connect my phone. But this has been a lot of social interaction with strangers in French for one day.

💃💃💃

Before the new lockdown (worth another post in itself), I met a French friend and we were able to go on bike rides to explore the area. He showed me where to find some amaaazing old castles and ruins.

Bike ride views


More bike ride views
And MORE bike ride views

Wandering through abandoned buildings
Hiking along rivers

With abandoned buildings alongside
And castles built into cliffsides

And there you have it. Hopefully my next post has more entertaining life and COVID things rather than boring explanation. Hope you enjoyed the update!

Monday, August 3, 2020

Between the Cutblock and the Sidewalk

 “Forty pine, forty larch, twenty spruce. It’s a long run so single-line in, fill the fingers, and bag out at the back. Don’t fuck up the access.”

 

My icicle fingers force stiff shoelaces through the metal hook eyelets at the top of my boots as my foreman calls out the instructions for the day. Myself and four other tree planters have just tumbled out of the warm pick-up truck into the frosty 8am mountain air. Beneath the layer of thick mist that will clear in a few hours, fallen logs and other slash form the graveyard of a forest that once was. We will soon begin slamming our shovels into the ground every 3-4 metres, covering the cut-block with three different species of tree: pine, spruce and larch. Cedar was probably logged as well, but it’s easier to log those on the coast so they rarely get replanted here in the interior British Columbia. Poplar, alder, balsam, and others definitely grew here once, but they don’t make great lumber – pine, larch, and spruce are ideal lumber.

 

We load our bags with between 300 and 500 baby trees. The percentage of each species we need to plant changes every day (40-40-20 today). The cut-block today is narrow and heads straight out from the landing with limited road access, forcing us to load our bags heavier than usual, plant as far as we can while filling any narrow logged blips along the treeline, then walk all the way back to the truck when we run out of trees. Planting back to the truck would save time walking at the start of the day but would cut off access to the back for the end of the day, and nothing is worse than having to deadwalk your last full bag-ups all the way to the back because you planted out the front at the beginning of the day.

 

Loaded with 50+ lbs of baby trees around our waists, we feel the spiked bottoms of our caulk boots scratch against the rocky landing until we climb up the cut-bank into the block. It will be nine hours, around two thousand trees each, and countless scrapes and bruises before the five of us clamber exhaustedly back into the truck.

 

 

My life gives the impression of being divided into two seemingly opposite halves:

1.     Attending school in the city (first undergrad and now grad school). This is almost entirely digital with occasional meet-ups either in class or in coffee shops. Physical exercise is usually for the sake of exercise and the most valued active part of myself is my brain.

2.     Tree planting in a remote work camp in British Columbia. Digital communication here is only out of necessity because the “real communication” happens in person in the moment; there is extremely limited cell service anyways. Physical exercise is the entire nature of the job and the most valued active part of myself is my body.

Is there something to learn from bouncing between these two extremes? Are they even as extreme as I’m making them out to be?

 

There is often a sense of “here and now” in tree planting camp that is difficult to find in my non-planting life. The increased sense of presence also helps me remember what happens in a day. I can describe in detail the many aspects of bush life; the people and conversations, the layout of the cut-block, the smells, the equipment, and how the weather/bugs/temperatures/crew morale/slash level/anything else affected the day. In my office life, there is little I can even remember happening in an entire day. What I can describe is typically side-hobbies rather than what I am actually doing in said office – the content of the courses I study for and social media interactions often leave my brain the moment I step away from the computer. When planting, I feel more; the physical exhaustion and pain caused by the job give way to relief so much more satisfying. Something as basic as water brings so much more joy while planting than it does in the office.

 

 

Jenny Odell, in her EYEO 2017 talk how to do nothing, discusses finding groundedness in the actual ground beneath our feet. We need a connection to the “direct, sensuous reality” of those things in our immediate presence. When listening to this, all I can think of is tree planting.

 

I think about the dirt caking onto my skin and behind my nails, remnants of these cut-blocks that will remain embedded onto my skin long after I leave them. The purplish bruises and scrapes will fade in the weeks after planting ends. As my body “heals” from the physicality of tree planting, it also separates from the world around me. The old dirt disappears from my skin as the shovel is replaced with a laptop. The only “fresh” dirt on my hands is from re-potting my mint plants into the dislocated dirt at least a foot from the actual ground. The cuts and bruises along my legs disappear as I walk along slash-free city sidewalks.

 

Slash - The tree residue left of the ground as a result of forestry and other vegetation being altered by forest practices or other land use activities. Slash includes materials such as logs, splinters or chips, tree branches and tops, uprooted stumps and broken or uprooted trees and shrubs.” (Ministry of Forests and Range 85.)

 

Alternatively: Slash – the dismembered and uprooted 70% of plant-bodies left behind after people are finished taking the 30% of plant-bodies they want from the decimated forest. Slash also includes new plant-bodies seeking to reclaim the forest, such as fast-growing alder and poplar

 

If cut-blocks are the graveyards of the forests and their destroyed plant-bodies, then cities are the graveyards of cut-blocks. Cities were cleared of forests much longer ago than the cut-blocks, but they still hold this natural past. All land does.

 

Maybe it’s the sense of “bio-permanence” that feels so grounding about digging through the dirt all day? Yes, people might clear the trees and even replace them with concrete sidewalks for a while, but they’ll be back. Whether we replant them or not, they’ll be back. It takes so much human effort to maintain the physical structures we’ve built on top of the dirt; renovating old buildings, cutting down trees growing too close to the road, repairing cracked sidewalks, uprooted grass growing inside the cracks. If we all just stopped for a while, the city would become “uninhabitable” by city standards but perfectly habitable for almost everything else. When we cut down a forest, whether or not we build a city on top, we make it “uninhabitable” for much of the life that was there before. But that life will also come back. What is habitable vs. inhabitable is just a matter of perspective.

 

 

This makes me wonder about the association a lot of people have between the natural world in general and “meaning.” People, myself included, often retreat from the city for brief periods in an attempt to find a refreshing relief from the fast pace and somewhat meaningless structure of city life. Why would people need “relief” from their lives? Why would a retreat require the “natural world” when people themselves are “natural”? What actually is a forest or “the natural world” and is it really gone just because we’ve put other “city things” on top? Just because it takes more time and effort to see the natural world while in the city doesn’t really mean it’s gone; just masked.

 

Thoreau’s oft-cited quest for meaning lead him to live beside Walden Pond for two years but the fact that he was even able to walk between Concord, Massachusetts, and his cabin in the woods is a far cry from what would be possible now. In the 1850s, few cities contained more than 100 000 people; today, that is hardly considered a city. Walking outside most cities nowadays would lead to smaller city neighbourhoods, then suburbs, then farmland, then towns, then more farmland, and then maybe some protected/regulated wildlife area.

 

To arrive in my own planting camp (in a typical non-COVID year) requires several flights, one 3-4 hour drive on a regular road, and another hour or so bumping down a windy dirt logging road. Deep along these logging roads through crown land are the only places I’ve seen homemade cabins with squatters living inside. But these cabins have a high chance of being issued a demolition order as “squatters rights” are essentially obsolete in British Columbia for both private and crown land.

 

Not that Thoreau would have cared much for the legality of his own cabin, but he would have a much greater chance of being evicted and slapped with a $100 000 fine now. His meticulously calculated expenses for the year pale in comparison even with inflation. Re-connection to and with the life (human too, but particularly non-human) around us in the way Thoreau imagined is no longer tenable. It’s no longer really possible to find meaning through total disconnection from our techno-industrial society.

 

There is another crucial element of planting life that, I’ve found, is difficult to find in city life: constant direct interaction with the same 40-50 people for the duration of the planting season. I personally know every individual I see in a day and can give my full attention to whoever I talk to. In the city, my energy and efforts are spread among different people in different places.  Rather than one cohesive group of 40-50 people sharing everything, there are hundreds of networks of different communities of people who cannot possibly dedicate all their time and effort into one intimate cause.

 

Andrew Sullivan, a former columnist in New York Magazine who found himself addicted to social media, articulates the importance of the types of direct human-to-human personal relationships. These are the types of interactions I find so often in planting camps but not city life:

Truly being with another person means being experientially with them, picking up countless tiny signals from the eyes and voice and body language and context, and reacting, often unconsciously, to every nuance. These are our deepest social skills, which have been honed through the aeons. They are what make us distinctively human.”

The reference to aeons of humanity is, I think, important because it links our current interactions with each other to an entire human history of connections. They are how we experience our very humanity. Encountering hundreds of nameless faces that I couldn’t possibly remember in one single day, interacting with strangers who flow seamlessly in and out of my life with no expectation of genuine connection or commitment, can feel disingenuous to the deeply unique, personal and human trait of building meaningful social communities with each other.   

 

 

 

So what do I make of the stark contrasts between tree planting and city life? Do I think everyone ditch a few months of their life every year to clamber around decimated forests and mountainsides far away from most civilization? Honestly, if people are (physically, financially, psychologically, etc.) able to, then probably. Canada’s reforestation initiatives are growing anyway so there’s lots of opportunity.

 

BUT is it necessary or even possible? I think there are three important aspects to the meaning I gain from tree planting but have a difficult time finding in the city. While it’s easier to find them while planting, maybe there are other ways.

1.     Physical connection to immediate surroundings

2.     Physical connection to people

3.     The combination of exhaustion and relief

This prioritization of physicality in relation to people, place, and effort helps guide my mind to a place of meaning. In planting camp, these three things happen all together, exerting my body physically through and in the land in close community with other planters.

 

It would be incredibly difficult to find these three things in a city that is so far removed from the altered natural world that exists far beneath it. To constantly re-connect oneself to that in the face of an entire techno-industrial society working against it would take a lot of willpower. If not full-blown a full-blown anarchist mindset to “burn it all down,” at least an active resistance to the disembodied, disconnected, and absent lifestyle somewhat expected of people in major cities.

 

I think there are groups and communities doing this; community gardens, intentional communities, teams of dumpster divers, etc, but I’m not sure these go far enough. Admittedly, it’s difficult to think of what would be “far enough” because it would need to be extremely grounded, present, and human when, frankly, an article can’t do that. Whatever “going far enough” is, it would mean connecting with some deep-rooted aspect of our humanity that our current techno-industrial society denies. I’m reminded of a planting memory from a previous year:

 

A piece of blue flagger marks the line of trees most recently planted by a crewmate. I slowly make my way alongside it, leaving my own row of blue flagger in my place. Chad, the planter two trees ahead of me, is moving slower than usual; we both are. It’s the end of the season and our bodies are weak with over 40 days of intense physical activity.

 

Suddenly, we hear a human screech from the opposite corner of the block. Startled, we both look up to see Molly, our spunky foreman, storming toward the truck in a fury.

 

“CHAD!” she screams, bouncing off the ground with the energy needed to release her roar. “CHAAAAD!”

 

“Whaaat?” Chad calls back. His voice betrays a hit of fear; Molly can be a sweet and protective foreman but she can also be a pillar of rage that will take you down in her stride.

 

In the distance, we can see Molly climb high up onto a log in order to ensure Chad’s attention, her own position of authority, and that her voice projects further.

 

“It’s CUSTOMARY,” she screams out in the direction of Chad, “in human societies to BURY YOUR SHIT!”

 

I stop planting to nearly cry with laughter and look at Chad, who has stopped as well and turned beet red.

 

“Yeah um… sorry?” He calls back, laughing uncomfortably.

 

Part of what I love about this memory is just the image of Molly stumbling upon a pile of Chad’s feces, then jumping on that log to scream about it. But also, in reference to this article, Molly’s outburst reconnected our own activities to those same aeons of human history that Andrew Sullivan did (albeit in a cruder manner). Whether into a city’s sewage system, a latrine, or holes dug by tiny tree planting shovels, we are still connected to this aeons-old human social custom of burying our feces. Sometimes planters like to think of themselves as rejecting “society” but really it is just one urbanized form of society (cities) they are rejecting.

 

This memory also contains all three of my favourite aspects of planting with a feeling of groundedness, embodiment, and presence. We were exhausted after the day's work at the time, but somehow this makes the memory even stronger: I distinctly remember what if felt like being there, laughing at Molly’s outburst and Chad’s response. There was also a strong feeling of camaraderie and connection between the five members of our crew that enabled us to build so many distinct memories that year.

 

If we are to reclaim in the city this sense of groundedness, embodiment, and presence that creates such meaningful memories, I think we’ll need to find other ways to reconnect to what and who we were before the city (aside from just fecal-buriers). We’ll need to rebuild this connection to the people around us, the physical ground beneath our feet, and our own physical body’s capacity and the need to act.

Tuesday, April 28, 2020

Rapunzel Fabliau


Author's Note: This version of Rapunzel is a fabliau intended to be a lower-class parody of both the classic tale of Rapunzel and the Disney version “Tangled”. While fabliaux started as French, this was mostly inspired by Chaucer's "The Miller's Tale" chapter from The Canterbury Tales. Two important archetypes in a fabliau are sexually active women and foolish, cuckolded husbands, all of whom are “punished” in some way at the end. They also have a lot of bawdy humour and crude slang, so beware.



Rapunzel

There was a tiny town called Rived
In which a happy couple lived.
Though blacksmithing was the man’s trade,
Hardly any income he made.

For every day he drank his fill                                    5
Until he could not work the anvil.
Then joking he would take a break,
Fall fast asleep and hardly wake.

The woman laughed her life away,
Hiding affairs by light of day.                                    10
Their lack of wealth was no concern,
For she had ways with which to earn
From other men collections
In exchange for her affections.

Her blund’ring husband never guessed                       15
Another’s wealth to her been blessed.

And so the two lived merrily,
Though quite extraordinarily.
The man: a blust’ring, drunken fool
And she: happy with their life to rule                           20

Until one great problem interfered
With all their jolly atmosphere.
In time she found herself with child,
For all her exploits reconciled.

She riled and roared at the news;                                  25
Her other life she’d have to lose!
Her husband knew not what to do
During the fits of wrath she through.

Since this behaviour was so strange,
Was his darling wife deranged?                                    30
Was not a child a dream come true?
To help earn money as he grew?

“I want a child in this house
As much as I would want a mouse!
By God, by Jove, I want it out!”                                    35
The town around could hear her shout,

“What good would e’er a child do
When his own father has no clue;
Could never be a champion.
Now bring me an herb called rampion!”                       40
           
He froze, stunned by her sudden rage
And not too eager to engage.
He stared straight in her stormy eyes,
Cow’ring before her angry cries.

Then whimpered under glow’ring gaze,                         45
“My dear, my love, why all this craze?
While I may not be a champion —.”

I ASKED FOR FUCKING RAMPION!

He stumbled back. He could not fend.
He knew not how to comprehend.                                  50
“Rampion I’ve never heard of,
Do you mean something else, my love?”

“It’s a type of bellflower plant,”
She growled, breath like fire-ants,
Though ‘neath her glower, she was pleased                   55
At this strange knowledge she’d conceived.  

He fled the house to find the herb,
Though partially in fear of her.
Of a farm the townsfolk told him
That did grow the herb in question.                                 60
Owned by an old lady whose spouse
Had died and she took over the house.
Gothel was this widow’s name,
And to her farm this poor man came.             

“Please, ma’am, I was told of an herb,                            65
Of which you own the most superb.
Some rampion my wife requires
And without it, I fear hellfire.”

But when Gothel named the price he cried.
’Twas far more than he could e’er provide,                     70

But Gothel understood his pain
And made a deal for both their gain:

“One handful you can have for free,
But any more is twice the fee.”

Delightedly he took the deal                                            75
And brought the herbs for his wife’s meal.

They soon discovered its foul taste;
Bitter, biting, swallowed in haste.
Yet sooner would she kiss a snake,
Then e’er admit to her mistake.                                       80

She smiled and forced a pleasant sigh.
Sent her husband again to buy
This foul herb they both deplored
And (greater still) could not afford.

With no money, he did appeal                                         85
To Gothel with a brand new deal.
Age 10, Gothel could have the child
Till all the debts were reconciled.       

Gothel agreed to this deal too,
For she needed a summer crew                                       90
To harvest crops and work the land
And save money on the farmhands.

Day after day, he bought more greens
Along with peppers, corn and beans,
Racking up considerable debt                                          95
For which his child would pay by sweat.

Eventually the child was born.
From a peaceful womb, cruelly torn.
Instant rejection the child faced,
Since both the parents were disgraced.                            100

For though her parents’ hairs were blonde
Young ebony curls brightly shone
And, after months, intensified.
Yet still the mother further lied:

“The wood stove was too hot for me,”                             105
She mourned the loss, explaining “See,
Look how it has burned our daughter,
Turned her hair black as an otter.”

Though instantly the husband thought
Of the dark-haired man his wife had taught                    110
To read and write for near a year,
He instantly shut out these fears.
He agreed the child had been scorched
And any other theory torched.

This child who suffered long was named                         115
Rapunzel, who was often shamed.
For her mother desired no kid
And from her father’s drinking hid.

She was in such misery when
Ten years later, Gothel showed again.                              120

When Gothel saw the child, she knew
It was poor, abused Rapunzel who
Would come to help her on her farm
And ne’er return to this home of harm.

Since Gothel had her husband die,                                  125
She cared for loss of family ties
And craved return of this connection.
She’d give the child love and affection.

Rapunzel packed her things to go
Eager to go where she did not know.                                130
Leaving, her parents did not plead,
For she’d be one less mouth to feed.

In fact, they did not call for years,
Promptly forgot without a tear.
Into a woman their daughter grew                                    135
Under the care of the kind, old shrew.

Now despite the pity Gothel showed,
Rapunzel’s lifestyle did corrode.
So unused to outdoor living,
She was cause for great misgivings.                                 140

Gothel’s focused, hands-on teaching
Never to Rapunzel reaching.
For eight long years she slacked and sighed,
Ignoring Gothel’s well-meant chides.

She also loved to brush her hair,                                        145
Grow it long and soft with care.

Gothel loved to see her happy,
But for farm work, this was crappy.
One cannot work in sweat and hay
With mounds of hair all in the way.                                 150

But she refused to cut it short
And always sought for ways to thwart          
Her daily chores by hiding in
The grain silo, drinking gin
And brushing tangles from her hair.                                155
Often a man would join her there,
To the top of her silo he’d glide
And fulfill her wishes inside.
If the silo was not hot enough,
Imagine their actions in the buff!                                     160

All this poor Gothel put up with,
But one day returned the blacksmith.
Older now, Rapunzel could work.
He thought she would be his shop clerk.       

But in his face his daughter spat,                                     165
“I’ll never live with you, you rat!”

Then Gothel kicked him off the land
And from returning he was banned.
For she ensured that on her farm
Her lazy Rapunzel would not be harmed.                       170

Rapunzel’s parents could not take
 “No” for an answer so they made
A floating lantern light the sky
And hoped their child would hear their cry.

“Just one lantern?” a neighbour asked,                           175
“‘It’d be a miracle if she saw that.”

Rapunzel’s parents saw this fact;
The lantern was too small an act.        
They needed something bigger so
Rapunzel could see from her window.                            180

Their conclusion seemed quite sensible;
Not slightly reprehensible.
What could seem more rationalist?
They became local arsonists.

They watched the first house burning down,                  185
Then next month burnt another in town.

Mastering incineration,
They came to the realization
Their daughter still would not return
Heedless of how many they burned.                               190
They needed something closer still,
That she could see from her windowsill.

Meanwhile, Rapunzel was the same
As she was before her parents’ flames.
Up in her silo passing time,                                             195
Aroused when boys could make the climb.

One day, young Colin trotted by
Upon his Clydesdale sitting high.
He dismounted and climbed the tower
Then was greeted with a glower!                                    200

“Wait a minute, I’m almost done,”
For brushing her hair she’d just begun.
“Oh come on, you’ll take forever,”
Colin pondered his endeavor.

But he was so committed he’d wait                                 205
Until her knotty hair was straight.
When she turned and smiled wryly,
He ran to satisfy her highly.

An hour later, they were done
All wet and sweaty from their fun.                                  210
“Sorry I took so long to finish.”
His fulfillment not diminished,

He said “It’s fine, I’ll come again
At any time; just tell me when.”

Suddenly Rapunzel cried out                                           215
And frantically began to shout,
“Do you smell that? I think it’s smoke!”
And presently began to choke.

Colin did smell the sulphur there
And ran fast over to the stairs.                                          220
But a blast of heat pushed him back
To where Rapunzel sat and gasped,

“There’s a fire and we can’t get down!”
The last she saw was Colin’s frown.                                  225

“Was that a scream?” her mother cried,
Running around the silo’s side,
The torch still blazing in her hand.
“Nonsense,” responded her husband,
“This silo’s full of grain and hay,
It must have been a passing jay.”                                       230

“STOP! STOP NOW! RAPUNZEL’S IN THERE!”
Gothel’s shouting filled the air.

Too late she came, the fire glowed
Down fell Rapunzel’s safe abode.
Inside, her dark hair charred straight black;                        235
Outside, Gothel's sobbing body wracked.

But while her mother stood and gawked,
Her father fell and cried in shock,
“From whence she came, so she returned!”
The conscience of her mother burned.                               240