“Wake up now, look alive, for here is a day off work just to praise Creation:
the turkey, the squash, and the corn, these things that ate and drank
sunshine, grass, mud, and rain, and then in the shortening days laid down
their lives for our welfare and onward resolve. There’s the miracle for you,
the absolute sacrifice that still holds back seed: a germ of promise to do the
whole thing again, another time. . . Thanksgiving is Creation’s birthday
party. Praise harvest, a pause and sigh on the breath of immortality.”
― Barbara Kingsolver , Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
Good morning, thank you for having me here. My name is Annalise, and
I’ve been asked here to talk about my experience farming. At first it was
hard. Then it was hard and tedious. And then it was therapeutical, hard and
tedious. I started with Laura Meister at Farm Girl Farm in Sheffield, and this
year I am managing a farm in Hadley, which is just an hour east of here.
Astarte, is a 3.5 acre farm. We use resilient, permaculture and
experimental practices. Our goal is to have as little bare soil as possible.
And we use perennial and annual herb ground covers to compete with
weeds. Many of our practices may pay off in 2 years, or 5 years, or we may
not see the results in our lifetime. We roll out cover crops for mulch,
compost and use beneficial insects to combat pests. We are up against a
dynamic challenge, not just the changing climate, but also the farms we are
surrounded by that spray harsh chemicals, and fill their fields with
pesticides.
We want Astarte to be a haven for biological life, which means all the
microscopic bugs, bacteria, fungi in the soil are thriving and working hard to
feed the plants that feed them. We are stewards of our land and doing what
we feel is right. The right practices that give back to the land that feeds us.
And there is no rule book, there is no one practice that rules them all. We
haven’t found the answer, and we may never find the answer as to the right
way to farm, but we sure are trying.
One of my first lessons in farming, was that there is always more to do.
There is never a time when I feel like everything is buttoned up. Except
maybe in the subzero blowing winds of January, a couple days of rest,
before ordering seed and planning for the thaw.
The profession and daily activity of farming, for me, is an overwhelming
behemoth, an intense longhaul through the season, enthusiasm that
seems to come from an endless spring in my core. It’s intangible, and at
the same time, undeniably concrete. We are working along side, in
harmony with, and sometimes in opposition to Nature. And I say Nature
with a capital N. It’s the big unknown. The God we pray to for rain, for sun,
for snow, for wind.
The intensity of farming reminds me of the intensity of Jesus’ love for us,
God’s love for us. It is so powerful, even to think about it can be
uncomfortable. How could he love me this much? How could he love me so
much that he gave me this beautiful earth, which edible plants simply grow
out of? Without care; they bear fruit, without harvest; they reseed
themselves?
It is a mystery, and it humbles me. When a breeze blows just right, and I
get out of the sun to take a drink of water, survey the field, and remember
just how small I am, I am reminded, and my desire to leave this earth better
than I found it, is invigorated.
I also want to talk a little about eating local. And I won’t give you statistics,
I’ll let those people who write books on the subject do that. But, think about
the things you filter out of your life. Maybe it is certain music, talk shows,
television programs, books, those thoughts and opinions you do not want to
ingest.
Well, I think many people think of their food that way. They eat
without really considering the sacrifice made for the food they are
putting in their bodies. As Barbara Kingsolver says, “There’s the
miracle for you, the absolute sacrifice that still holds back seed: a germ of
promise to do the whole thing again, another time.” Food is very complex.
Food has to do with sacrifice of seeds, and animals, and workers. Food has
to do with those hands that planted the seed, those hands that planted the
seedling, those eyes that looked at the fruit and decided, “Yes, this one is ready
for market today.” Those hands that brought the fruit in from the field to wash,
pack and deliver. I think of those hands, those many hands that feed us.
I imagine those hands have families they go home to and hold hands with,
maybe saying grace, maybe playing a game, or helping another hand up
the stairs. All those hands that work very hard to bring food to our tables.
And when there is a large business that processes and packages, and
alters your food, and it travels for hundreds of miles, those hands are lost
along the way to conveyor belts, to cold steel machinery and a
disconnected workforce.
Now I don’t want to spend too much time talking about this because there
are plenty of documentaries, articles and books about ‘Big Ag’, but what I
want to say to you, is that it doesn’t have to be a political decision, or a
financial decision, or for any other reason than how your heart feels when
you think about all those hands.
There is a creamery in Hadley that has a slogan on their ice cream
containers that reads, “If they say it’s local, ask to see their cows!” So I say
to you, if they say they’re farmers, if they say it’s local, ask to see the
hands.