The Middle of Nowhere (Can you find it on a map?)
Working from home on websites for international customers has
certain occupational hazards if you live out in the middle of
nowhere.
Allow me to explain. I pay for my family's daily rations of
bread, water and the occasional snow flake (when in season) by
promoting my clients' sites, mostly to the search engines. My
clients don't live just down the road from me. That's mostly
because my clients are neither sheep nor cows, but also because
they are comfortably settled in Australia, Britain, Florida, the
Midwest, California and other far-flung places.
Occasionally, one of them wants to know where in Canada my
operations are located. It would sound most impressive to mumble
something about a 32nd floor vista overlooking the Toronto
harbor, then hold the phone out the window to capture the sound
of honking horns and shouts of foul language below.
However, a more honest answer would be that I am overlooking
snow, trees, and snow...and in the distance I can see the barn
where the sheep choir practices on summer afternoons.
I suppose I could fake it. The problem is that they don't sell
CDs full of honking and swearing. And relaxation music probably
won't impress many clients.
So I just tell the truth. I live in the middle of nowhere.
But where exactly is the middle of nowhere? About a mile to the
east is Dunbar, a fourteen-home hamlet that boasts two churches,
a community hall, a play park, a lube service for farm
equipment, and the tulip lady, whose yard is somewhat messy but
looks like a festival every spring.
A mile to the west is Elma, a hamlet that boasts a dozen houses
and a truck.
We live in a nameless hamlet half-way between, but we do
overlook the Elma Public School, which must have immigrated
during a slowdown in the Elma economy (the truck driver went on
vacation!).
Think I'm making this up because this is a humor column and I'm
supposed to stretch the truth to make it sound funny? Not this
time. But wait