where my food comes from
I can barely move, I'm so sore. It's great.
On Friday afternoon I took a bus down into Maryland where I was picked up by a bare-footed G and her three daughters, aged 2, 4, and 5. I squeezed between two car seats in the back of a station wagon, and we made a couple of stops before heading back to the farm. On the way, M (5 years old) talked nonstop, explaining to me how she opens up to people very quickly ("well, not to men"), but that her younger sister, R, is shy at first. But by the time we pulled up to the house, all three girls were tickling me and climbing into my lap.
We spent about an hour on Friday slowly walking around the farm, with G pointing out all of the different vegetables. Other than the farms where I've gone berry or peach-picking, the only farm I can compare this to is the huge corn farm belonging to some distant relatives in Kansas. This was so different--it's much smaller, it's organic, and they grow all sorts of vegetables, as well as figs, persimmons, and kiwis. We walked through the cherry tomato rows and picked handfuls of the first sungolds of the season, then dug up some tender potatoes whose skins haven't toughened enough to be harvested for market. G showed me how to tell when the garlic is ready to harvest. Somewhere along the way, we ran out of hands to carry vegetables, and G suggested to M that she take off her shirt so that we could turn it into a bag. Her younger sisters thought this looked like a good idea, and soon they were all completely naked and doing somersaults on the mounds of compost. The 2-year-old made several rolls through the dirt and came to rest on her back, grinning up at the sky.
The next morning I got up at 5:30 and went out to the fields to work. As I hauled a cart full of lettuce up the hill for the third time, I could tell that I would be very sore the next day. All told, I helped harvest fennel, cabbage, green looseleaf lettuce, romaine, Boston lettuce, and radicchio. Then we took a short break for breakfast. H used the undercutter to loosen the soil around the carrots and garlic. Pulling up the carrots was my favorite part of the day. They're such a beautiful surprise to find in the wet dirt. It had unexpectedly rained Friday night, so there were puddles and mud everywhere. After kneeling and sitting my way down a row of carrots and a row of garlic, I was covered in mud and completely soaked.
After lunch I helped wash the garlic and put it out on racks to dry, and then went to help wash cabbage, carrots, and salad greens and box them up for market. H has three workers who live on the farm, and there were two of us who were just there for the weekend. At 6, H told us to finish what we were doing and stop for the day (he didn't come in until 9:30). When I walked into the kitchen, covered in mud, the 2-year-old (obviously fresh from a bath) ran up to give my knee a hug. I then took a most welcome shower and sat down to dinner with G and the girls. I made it until about 9 o'clock and couldn't stay awake any longer. Sometime in the night I woke up to find that the two older girls had crawled into bed with me.
At 5:30 this morning I left with H to drive back to DC for the market. I'm exhausted, and even walking around my house hurts. It was a great weekend, and hopefully I'll be able to visit again.
On Friday afternoon I took a bus down into Maryland where I was picked up by a bare-footed G and her three daughters, aged 2, 4, and 5. I squeezed between two car seats in the back of a station wagon, and we made a couple of stops before heading back to the farm. On the way, M (5 years old) talked nonstop, explaining to me how she opens up to people very quickly ("well, not to men"), but that her younger sister, R, is shy at first. But by the time we pulled up to the house, all three girls were tickling me and climbing into my lap.
We spent about an hour on Friday slowly walking around the farm, with G pointing out all of the different vegetables. Other than the farms where I've gone berry or peach-picking, the only farm I can compare this to is the huge corn farm belonging to some distant relatives in Kansas. This was so different--it's much smaller, it's organic, and they grow all sorts of vegetables, as well as figs, persimmons, and kiwis. We walked through the cherry tomato rows and picked handfuls of the first sungolds of the season, then dug up some tender potatoes whose skins haven't toughened enough to be harvested for market. G showed me how to tell when the garlic is ready to harvest. Somewhere along the way, we ran out of hands to carry vegetables, and G suggested to M that she take off her shirt so that we could turn it into a bag. Her younger sisters thought this looked like a good idea, and soon they were all completely naked and doing somersaults on the mounds of compost. The 2-year-old made several rolls through the dirt and came to rest on her back, grinning up at the sky.
The next morning I got up at 5:30 and went out to the fields to work. As I hauled a cart full of lettuce up the hill for the third time, I could tell that I would be very sore the next day. All told, I helped harvest fennel, cabbage, green looseleaf lettuce, romaine, Boston lettuce, and radicchio. Then we took a short break for breakfast. H used the undercutter to loosen the soil around the carrots and garlic. Pulling up the carrots was my favorite part of the day. They're such a beautiful surprise to find in the wet dirt. It had unexpectedly rained Friday night, so there were puddles and mud everywhere. After kneeling and sitting my way down a row of carrots and a row of garlic, I was covered in mud and completely soaked.
After lunch I helped wash the garlic and put it out on racks to dry, and then went to help wash cabbage, carrots, and salad greens and box them up for market. H has three workers who live on the farm, and there were two of us who were just there for the weekend. At 6, H told us to finish what we were doing and stop for the day (he didn't come in until 9:30). When I walked into the kitchen, covered in mud, the 2-year-old (obviously fresh from a bath) ran up to give my knee a hug. I then took a most welcome shower and sat down to dinner with G and the girls. I made it until about 9 o'clock and couldn't stay awake any longer. Sometime in the night I woke up to find that the two older girls had crawled into bed with me.
At 5:30 this morning I left with H to drive back to DC for the market. I'm exhausted, and even walking around my house hurts. It was a great weekend, and hopefully I'll be able to visit again.
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