Journal Entry 3

In the year of our Lord Feb 7, 800.  Days just seem to grind on.  It is now winter and some snow has fallen.  Though my days are difficult, I am thankful for the protection my knight and my noble provides me.  I work hard to do my best with my job because I know that the Lord will reward me in Heaven.  Below I will share with you the details of  my daily life.

My type of clothing.

First, I will talk about what I look like.  I wear a dress made of a very cheap woolen material because I can afford hardly anything.  I fasten the dress around my waist with a belt.  I usually wear a thick woolen shawl when it is cold and ocassionally, mittens.  Now, my daily life.  I wake up at dawn, and in the summer, I can wake up as early as 3 am.  I then have to wake up my two children.  For breakfast, I eat either bread or pottage, a mixture of soupy grains and oats.  I am the blacksmith of the manor.  I spend my days working with metal to make weapons and armor for the knight.  My husband is a farmer, so he spends his days out working in the fields.  My children also have things to do.  They are six and eight years old. For most of the day, they help my husband in the fields and in their free time they play with the few toys they have.  My children make me enjoy my day more because I love them very much and they remind me that I should be a good mother and person to go to heaven.

I depend on other people on the manor, also.  For example, I rely on the farmers for food, the miller for bread, the barber for pulling out teeth, limbs, and cutting hair, and of course the knight for protection.   Now, I can discuss some things that are a bit more lighthearted.  In these difficult times, it is hard to find things to enjoy, but I still can go to events such as tournaments.  In tournaments, people compete in many different activities, such as archery, axe throwing, and knights jousting.  Watching these activities is entertaining for peasants like me.  Then, later in the day, I do other things.  For lunch and dinner, I usually eat the same thing - I take a dried mixture of pottage and then pour beer into it.  It doesn’t taste the best, but it’s what I can afford.

Two knights jousting.

A peasant's house that is better than mine.

Going later in the day, my lifestyle does not get much better.  I hardly ever take showers - only about twice a year.  However, the nobles bathe once a week!  I am quite jealous of their luxury.  Then, I go to bed at around 10 o’clock at night.  I sleep on a bed made of hay, which is bad because insects are always crawling around me and biting me, but it is good because hay is more comfortable than some other materials, for instance, wood.  Now that I’ve shared with you a regular day in my life, I should discuss some things I wish I could change about my lifestyle.  It would be better if I had a better house, clothes, and pay.  Also, I wish I could change the amount of time I have to work, because every day, I work for a very long time, which gets tiring.  This is my day, as you can see, peasant life is not the best.