It is not likely that a person who changes his pursuits will ever succeed in taking on the character or the appearance of the new man, however much he would like to. I am farming, to a small degree and for my own amusement, but it is a cheap imitation of the real thing. I have fitted myself out with standard equipment, dungarees and a cap; but I would think twice before I dared stand still in a field of new corn. In the minds of my friends and neighbors who really know what they are about and whose clothes really fit them, much of my activity has the quality of a little girl playing house. My routine is that of a husbandman, but my demeanor is that of a high school boy in a soft-drink parlor. This morning, carrying grain to my birds, I noticed that I was unconsciously imitating the young rooster—making a noise in my throat like a cock learning to crow. No farmer has the time or the temperament for vaudeville of this sort. He feeds his flock silently, sometimes attentively, sometimes absent-mindedly, but never banteringly. He doesn’t go round his place making noises in his throat.

Another time I caught myself carrying a paper napkin in my hand, as I wandered here and there. I have never seen a farmer carrying a paper napkin around his barnyard.

E. B. White, “Clear Days”, in One Man’s Meat