But Where Would the Fun Be in That?

Harvest Hosts people are so helpful, even when you don't want them to be.

For those unfamiliar with Harvest Hosts, it's a membership program that allows people traveling in self-contained RVs to stay overnight at farms, wineries, breweries, and other interesting locations around the country. We've been hosting travelers at American Way Farm for several years, and it's been a wonderful way to meet people from all over. After each visit, the host and guest have an opportunity to leave reviews about their experience.

Now, most hosts write perfectly respectable reviews along the lines of “Wonderful guests, very pleasant, left everything clean, welcome back anytime.” There's absolutely nothing wrong with that approach, but I'm a storyteller, and I find it considerably more entertaining to write something a little less predictable. Even the most uneventful overnight visit can inspire an unusual five-star review if I put my imagination to work. Besides, I figure people who have driven halfway across the country deserve something more memorable than a sentence that could just as easily describe the last twenty campers.

Recently, I wrote a humorous post in a Harvest Hosts Facebook group about the challenges of coming up with these reviews. I thought other hosts might appreciate the idea of finding something entertaining to say about people who had arrived, parked, behaved themselves, and departed without incident.

What I hadn't anticipated was the outpouring of helpful advice.

Several people assured me that I didn't have to go to all that trouble. Why not write one generic review, save it somewhere, and simply copy and paste it whenever another guest left? It would be so much easier, they explained, and think of all the time I'd save!

Well, of course it would be easier. I could also buy eggs at the grocery store instead of keeping chickens, eat frozen dinners instead of cooking, and stop writing stories altogether. Just imagine how efficient my life would become if I eliminated everything I enjoyed doing simply because there was an easier alternative. I'd have so much spare time I could sit in my recliner and contemplate the remarkable achievement of having absolutely nothing interesting left to do.

Eventually, I added an edit to the original post explaining that yes, I knew perfectly well that I could write generic reviews, but where would the fun be in that? Fortunately, that seemed to stem the tide of helpful suggestions before somebody offered to design a spreadsheet to automate the entire process.

In one exchange, I explained to a particularly helpful commenter that I'm a creative writer and humorist, and if I couldn't come up with something more entertaining than a standard review, I might as well hang up my hat. Her response was reassuring. “Then I bet your reviews are probably fine.”

Fine?

I've written a book, had my work recognized internationally, with one reviewer describing me as “one of the most honest, down to earth, hilarious authors of our time.” After all those years of writing, countless hours at the keyboard, and enough livestock-related disasters to fill a book, I had finally achieved the pinnacle of literary recognition. A complete stranger on Facebook was reasonably confident that my Harvest Hosts reviews were probably fine.

I know she meant well, and I'm sure all the others did too. They were simply trying to save me from a task they assumed I found burdensome. What they hadn't realized was that the supposed burden was the very thing I enjoyed. I wasn't looking for a way to stop writing entertaining reviews. I was looking for more entertaining ways to write them.

The irony, of course, is that all those considerate people trying to save me the trouble of writing have now provided enough material for another story. Their suggestions may not have improved my efficiency, but they've certainly improved my supply of material, and I didn't even have to wait for another camper to arrive.

So to all the wonderfully helpful Harvest Hosts members, thank you for your concern, your suggestions, and your generous assessment of my literary abilities. I promise to keep writing unnecessarily complicated reviews for perfectly ordinary visits, because sometimes the fun is in doing something you don't have to do.

And if this story turns out to be merely fine, I suppose I can live with that, too.

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