Done with Dolgowitz: Last Night In Loebau

Today marks the last day of our stay at the Dolgowitz farm near Loebau, and contrary to the law of diminishing returns, we’ve managed to remain productive right up to the very end. This morning I mixed one more batch of historical concrete and put a few final touches on the concave brick ceiling in the entry room. I can say with some degree of confidence that I’m pretty sure the room will not collapse and cave in on itself when winter brings its grueling trial of freezes and thaws.

I am less confident that the gardens will not be over run with weeds before the middle of July. But that’s no fault of ours. We spent a preponderance of the last two days hunched over among the potatoes with fistfuls of thistles and dandelions. The weeds, grasses and vegetables all grow with relentless ferocity this time of year; no surprise when there are 18+ hours of sunlight per day and something close to an inch of rainfall each week.

For the time being anyway, the garden looks beautiful, a living testament to our diligent weeding, mulching and soil amending. And all in all, we are feeling quite satisfied with the work we’ve been able to accomplish over the course of our 20-day stint, and our gracious hosts seem to share that satisfaction. Although our children made every effort to distract us from our duties, we were able to get more than a reasonable amount of work done, and the fact is we never went a entire day without working. We did do a couple of short days so that we could visit the dinosaur park near Bautzen and see the city of Görlitz on the Polish border, but work-exchange volunteers are typically only expected to work five days a week.

In addition to causing various power tools to malfunction, and performing more physical labor than we ordinarily accomplish in an entire year, we also made great strides in our cultural education, a major part of why we’re taking this trip in the first place. We watched our children speak more German than ever before, and Millie got a good chuckle by listening to me attempt it myself. We also had some success in demonstrating for them the meaning of a hard day’s work and training them to either make themselves useful or get out of the way. It’s most rewarding for all of us when we can find a way for the kids to get involved and feel like they are contributing to the work effort.

Mom spent much of her free time this month identifying rare birds and insects, and also derived great satisfaction from engaging with friendly new Germans and finding herself in the middle of more deep conversations than she saw in California in ten years. Meanwhile, I have been tracking common toads and hedgehogs, while also getting the most out of my Kindle, filling my leisure time with German philosophy and Russian novels, including one that may have earned the unique distinction of being my least favorite work of my most favorite author.

In defense of this selection, I do prefer my reading to be thematically and geographically relevant, so Dostoyevsky’s “House of the Dead” succeeded in these respects. Twenty minutes from the Polish border, this is probably the closest we’re going to get to Russia this year, and the semi-autobiographical account of a forced labor camp seemed marginally appropriate given our current circumstances.

In any case, we are being released tomorrow on account of our good behavior, and a wide open road lies before us. We have thoroughly enjoyed our stay here, getting to know the people and getting a rough idea of what it takes to restore and maintain a piece of property like this one. The overall experience has been most enriching and illuminating, and very much in line with what we were expecting. Now, as we look ahead to our next tour of duty in Bavaria, one thing is certain, we still have plenty to look forward to.