Episode 1: Returning to Farming
$공$금$
“It seems you have temporarily developed an anxiety disorder due to stress.”
Anxiety disorder.
From time to time, my heart would pound, and a pressure so intense that I could barely breathe would come over me.
Urged by those around me, I had visited the hospital half-expecting something, so the doctor’s diagnosis of an anxiety disorder came as a bit of a shock.
Then again, symptoms like loss of appetite, insomnia, hypersensitivity, and decreased motivation were things that could only be explained by some kind of illness.
I hadn’t had these symptoms from the start, but they had begun appearing one by one after my father passed away last year.
My mother had passed away early when I was ten, and my father had left my side last year due to liver cancer.
Was it because I was left alone in this world?
Or was it because of the guilt of having turned away from my father when he asked me to live with him?
As time passed, the anxiety had grown worse; it seemed my mental state had weakened considerably.
“If it gets worse from here, it could develop into a panic disorder.”
When I had seen stories on TV about celebrities suffering from panic disorders, I had thought they were other people’s problems with no connection to me. I had never dreamed I would end up like that.
“What do you think I should do?”
“For now, I think it would be best to take medication and get some rest.”
I accepted the doctor’s recommendation and decided to take time off work to rest.
At first, I had planned to travel, but instead I came down to the country house. It had been left empty since my father passed away, making it the perfect place to rest quietly alone.
True to the doctor’s words, coming down to this quiet place eased my mind, and the symptoms of my pounding heart decreased significantly.
‘Minu, want to return to farming and live with your father?’
Those words had always echoed in my ears, weighing down on my chest like guilt. Yet the moment I came down to the countryside, my heart felt at ease.
After sleeping comfortably for several days like that, I began to wonder what it would be like to continue living here.
And I began to contemplate leaving the city and returning to farming, just as my father had urged me while he was alive.
The place I was currently working at was an accounting office, and the upcoming March was the busiest month of the year. By then, the stress from work would likely be no joke.
The endless cycle of overtime.
My body was already ruined from a herniated disc I had developed while working; I couldn’t let my mind break down too.
“Yeah, let’s go down to the countryside and rest a bit.”
****
“Minu, do you really have to go to the countryside?”
When I first told them I was going to return to farming, all my friends tried to stop me.
Those grateful guys who had helped with my father’s funeral.
My friends talked about the difficulties of returning to farming and told me to think it over again. I wasn’t oblivious to what they were worried about.
Since I had lived in the countryside until high school, I knew better than anyone that there would be various inconveniences once I actually went down there.
And these days, with the internet being so developed, if you just searched for the difficulties of returning to farming, you would be flooded with related articles and videos.
The locals’ territoriality.
The difficulties of crop selection and sales.
The lack of infrastructure.
And so on.
Thinking about it, there seemed to be more difficulties than comforts, but I had seen news that the farming-return population had increased by 10% last year.
To earn money.
To become healthy.
Because they love nature.
Because they’re tired of city life.
People were leaving the cities and coming to the countryside for various reasons.
And I too had decided to return to farming for the sake of rest.
I was worried about whether I could farm well, but these days there was a lot of farming-return education, and through books, blogs, and YouTube, you could learn farming more easily and in greater detail than before.
I planned to study those and slowly try the things I could do.
As I wrapped up my city life and studied returning to farming, I came across a story that really resonated with me.
The era of capitalism.
It is a world where you can do many things with money.
Even for me, with experience living in the countryside, it was a statement I could relate to immensely.
In the first place, buying land with no foundation in the countryside, acquiring a house, and returning to farming is no easy task.
But I had land and a house my father had left behind.
Come to think of it, this was partly why I had been able to decide on returning to farming with a lighter heart.
On top of that, I had a little money saved up from living in the city, so I could say I was starting from a better position than others.
And the important thing was that this wasn’t all.
While preparing to move and sorting through my father’s remaining belongings, I found a small piece of paper in the pocket of his work clothes.
A lottery ticket with numbers written on it.
One of my father’s hobbies had been buying lottery tickets; he must have bought it before he passed away and put it in his pocket.
I didn’t have high expectations, but with a just-in-case mindset, I checked the numbers, and I couldn’t help but be shocked.
“It’s the first prize?”