The 88 days
Between Orchards and Onions
After scoring a short-term gig on an apricot farm, I drove out to Mypolonga, a tiny spot in rural South Australia. The apricots needed picking and drying, and I was their picker-of-the-moment. I parked my van near the orchards and started picking. The apricot season was off. Too much rain had spoiled a good portion of the harvest. I’d strap on a basket, wander through rows of trees, and try to gauge the perfect orange hue. If I picked them too green, I’d get called out. Yet after hours in the orchard, the colors blended. It all felt like guesswork.
In the shed, I spent another hour each day popping apricot pits that refused to fall out during processing. High-speed, repetitive work that sent my mind spiraling into numbness. Outside, I chose to sleep in my van. There was a rundown shack of a “house” on the property where the other worker, Travis, slept. He’d been picking fruit for decades—once known as the “orange boy.” He was a keen observer of anomalies in the world, constantly digesting offbeat information. Some days, listening to him felt like wading through a dense forest of ideas, unsure which path led to truth. I learned to hold my boundaries, not because he was malicious, but because the endless stream of theories and data could overwhelm me. I realized I didn’t need a definitive answer to every claim. It was enough to know how I felt and stay grounded in my own experience.
When the apricot season ended, I visited Carol, the woman who’d invited me to dinner after we met by chance on the roadside. She lived in Murray Bridge with her son, Kieran, and their dog Brax. Their home became a warm stopover, a place to decompress from the orchard. I rested there for a week, gathering my strength for the next job—this time on an onion farm. It would count toward my 88 required days of rural work, a must-do if I wanted to stay another year in Australia.
If apricots were tough, onions were relentless. Eight-hour shifts grading onions on a conveyor belt or stacking heavy bags left me drained. Thousands of onions passed under my fingertips, and I had to discard the rotten ones, the stones, the weeds. The physical strain built up, lower back aching from constant leaning, arms protesting every lift above my head. Some days I found a trance-like state—just get through it, onion by onion. Other times, I felt every second drag, each onion a reminder that I was pouring precious hours into a task that offered no growth, no creativity. I kept asking myself: Why am I doing this?
The answer: to finish these 88 days, to secure another year in Australia. But as the weeks wore on, I couldn’t ignore a nagging sense of dread. What if this became my life, day in and day out? I observed colleagues—some who’d done such work season after season—and wondered where their ambitions had gone. Maybe they had dreams once. Maybe circumstances, responsibilities, debts, children, or a dozen other factors had pressed them into this mold. This wasn’t just hard work; it was a trap for some, a cycle of subsistence that left little room for new possibilities. The thought frightened me. I could imagine a path—if I stayed too long, if I lost my grip on my own goals—where I, too, might settle. Fall into a routine that slowly drained me of all energy for change.
My journal notes from this time are scattered with attempts to hold onto something meaningful. Early-morning yoga, meditation, or breathwork in my van. Weekend escapes to Carol’s place, where home-cooked meals, conversation, and laughter restored me enough to face another week of onions. Carol and Kieran treated me like family, and I sank into that comfort gratefully. That oasis of kindness kept me from spiraling too far into despair. It sure would’ve been a different story without them.
Despite the mental fog of repetitive labor, I still tried to grasp my scattered dreams. I wrote about learning videography, building a homestead someday, and bikepacking across New Zealand. I imagined future versions of myself—healthier, freer, rooted in a community of my own making. But the fear lingered. The onion belt became a metaphor for what can happen if you lose track of where you’re going. Society nudges us into big decisions early, often before we know who we are. It’s easy to slide into patterns—jobs, mortgages, obligations—and wake up one day trapped, all that early potential crushed under routine.
As the months rolled on, I learned less about onions and more about endurance. I learned the power of a supportive community—like Carol’s family—and the difference even a weekend of kindness can make. I learned to keep a spark alive inside me, no matter how small, reminding myself that this was temporary. That I didn’t have to stay in this box. The 88 days would pass, and I’d move on.
Eventually, I did complete those 88 days. The relief was immense. I took time afterward to service my van, install solar panels, and ready myself for the open road again. But the mark those weeks left on me was indelible. I saw how easily someone could get stuck, how a life can become a series of repetitive tasks if you don’t keep an eye on your inner compass. I felt compassion for those who never had the chance to step back, who got caught too soon and couldn’t escape.
Looking back, the orchard and onion fields didn’t hand me any grand epiphanies. They tested my patience, my body, and my outlook. They reminded me how easily we can slip into routines that erode our dreams. But they also revealed the power of small kindnesses, of community, and of nurturing that inner spark.
I learned that the first step might be freeing myself from the world’s definitions—from the “head” of society telling me what success looks like. Yet the real growth comes from going deeper, beyond logic and labels, to actually listening and feeling. Asking who I am and what I want is only the start. Feeling it, letting it resonate in the quieter spaces of my heart, guides me toward a truer path—one where I choose my direction, rather than drifting into someone else’s.
Check out the YT-video I made on this chapter.