Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Confession

I have a slight obsession with vegetables.

On harvest days, I often feel the need to point out the most beautifully colored beets or the largest cucumbers to the farmers or the other interns. “Look at this one!” I’ll say proudly. You’d think after harvesting thousands of vegetables, the excitement would die down. Somehow, it never does.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

New York Fairy Tale

Yesterday morning I parked my car at the Trenton Transit Center to catch the next train to New York. I asked the man in the lot how long I could leave my car there. Until twelve, he told me, and in my mind he automatically turned into my fairy godmother saying, “Be home by the stroke of midnight!” I stared at my feet. I was wearing cowboy boots, not glass slippers, and had packed a pair of flip-flops in my bag in case it got too hot. My bag was also full of vegetables from the farm. I was going to visit my former roommate, who is still living in our apartment, and I was bringing them to her for the homemade dinner we had planned to cook.

When I got off the train in the city, the nostalgia hit immediately. I felt that rush of excitement that only New York City brings- the busy sidewalks, the fast pace, the people with purple hair and outrageous outfits. Having been away from the city for so many weeks, I was glad to find it exactly as I left it. Well, almost.

The Calvin Klien billboard on Houston Street has switched from four topless models to a woman in a bikini and the park on Lafayette is nearly finished being constructed. But it wasn’t the physical changes that struck me so much way I fit into the city- Cinderella at the ball, slightly unsure of how things work. I usually give out whatever food I have to the homeless man on the subway, but I wasn’t sure that he would have appreciated the bok choy or hakurei turnips from my bag. And when we sat on a bench eating Pink Berry yogurt on Spring Street, I couldn’t tell if the drops falling on us were from the rain or air conditioner residue.

The thing that I love about New York City though, is that none of this matters. I could have worn my farming hat and ripped jeans around the village, and no one would have looked at me any differently. It’s that nonjudgmental quality that I love the most, and as we sat in the apartment, eating sautéed Chinese cabbage and sugar snap peas, I thought about my two worlds, the city and the farm, and liked that I could have a little bit of both.

When the clock struck nine I knew I had to be on my way back to the train station to make it to my car in time. It felt early and I wasn’t ready to leave one home for the other quite yet. But I didn’t want my car to turn into a pumpkin (as much as I love pumpkins), and so I took the familiar route- BDF train to West Fourth Street, ACE to Penn Station, and before I knew it the bright lights of the ball faded into the distance.

When I got home, I took off my boots and emptied my bag; out came the book I brought for the train, my wallet, my cell phone. But as I fished around the bottom, I realized that something was missing. I left my flip-flops in the apartment.

At least I won’t have to wait around for prince charming to bring them back. Instead it looks like another trip to the city will be in my near future, and for me that will be just fine.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Plans

Today marks the end of my fifth week at the farm, half way through the ten weeks I was planning to work there. Already, I'm starting to think of ways it won't have to end. The cucumbers and summer squash that we transplanted on my first week were ready to be harvested for the first time today, and the tomatoes and peppers are not far behind. I can barely stand the thought of having to leave as the blackberries ripen, especially knowing I will miss the pumpkins and potatoes completely in the fall.

I told the farmers that maybe, instead of taking August off, I can just cut back to part time until I have to leave for New York. Then once school starts, I'm thinking I can come back whenever I'm home for long weekends or holidays. But the crops will die come winter break, and I hate planning what I'm going to eat for breakfast in the morning, let alone planning what I'll be doing come the spring. Somehow though, I can't seem to stop planning ways I can come back to farming when I graduate college. I guess it's the thought of forever leaving this place in the past that makes me desperate to work it into the future. That, or picking too many cucumbers (753!) has made me go slightly insane.

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Vegetarian's Dilemma

I’ve been a vegetarian for over two years. I cut meat out of my diet the day I learned about the treatment of animals on factory farms and never looked back. However, the problems with the meat industry in our country go far beyond cruelty to animals. From a health perspective, industrially produced meat is packed with antibiotics, hormones, and other harmful chemicals. Environmentally, avoiding industrial meat reduces energy consumption and greenhouse gas pollution.

My view on vegetarianism has always been that, in a society where people treated animals, human health, and the environment with respect, I would eat meat. After all, humans, by nature, are omnivores. If this is my view, shouldn’t that mean that I would eat meat if it was produced under these stipulations? I can’t give you a reason why I don’t eat this kind of meat, but it never used to concern me. It’s only recently that I’ve begun to see my vegetarianism as a bit hypocritical. Michael Pollan sums up the problem with vegetarianism in The Omnivore’s Dilemma, and it’s gotten me thinking. Here’s a brief and nerdy summary of my newly forming thoughts on the issue:

The truth is that in a natural ecosystem, predator and prey balance each other out. Without prey for food, predators would die of starvation. Without predators, prey would become over-populated, run out of food, and thus, also die of starvation. If nature provides this perfect balance, it seems that the right thing to do, as human beings, is to fulfill our role as the predator. By eating local meat, we are also reducing the energy costs of importing protein that we need from other places.

I’ve been telling myself lately that, if given the opportunity to eat local, organic, and ethically produced meat, I would do it. I’ve been telling myself lies. Today, a CSA member and I got into a discussion about local meat. It just so happens that this CSA member buys lamb from a local organic farm and cooks it with mushrooms that he gathers himself, along with fresh veggies from the farm. It also just so happens that tomorrow night is the June potluck and that this member is planning to prepare this dish to bring along. Here is my chance.

The problem is that I know if I go to tomorrow’s potluck, I will avoid the lamb. When I think about lamb dinner, I can’t not picture a baby sheep. And when I picture a baby sheep, my natural omnivore instincts go out the window, because the last thing I want to do to that baby sheep is eat it. I can’t believe I just wrote that. When people ask me why I won’t eat lamb, I refuse to tell them it’s because I think lambs are cute. Michael Pollan would be ashamed.

How can it be that all of my sophisticated thoughts on meat-eating boil down to this?

Well, all I can say for myself is that at least those more complex thoughts exist. For now, that will have to be enough- and so will the vegetarian options at tomorrow’s potluck dinner.

Monday, June 22, 2009

Turnips, Cabbage, Mulberries

Take a look at some crops from our harvest, plus my stylish new farming hat! Now if only the sun would come out so I can actually wear it.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Dream

On Tuesday afternoon it took over an hour to transplant one row of leaks. I was burning up with fever and barely had enough energy to push the plants far enough into the ground. I left early without making sure they were okay.

Last night I fell asleep to the sound of rain pounding the roof, and I dreamt that the leaks we planted started to turn grey. I was afraid I had ruined them and was running up and down the row trying the push them back in the ground, but they weren’t dying. Instead, they were growing too fast. The stems grew until they were taller than me, taller than the barn and the trees, and kept on growing until they weren’t leaks anymore but buildings.

I stood there and watched as the farm turned into New York City, my beloved city, that I love and miss. Normally I love when Manhattan appears in my dreams, but this time I woke up sweaty and crying. I wasn’t sure if it was from a fever or a nightmare. I think maybe it was a little of both.

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Sick

In bed sick and the only thing I can think of is how bad I feel that I'm missing the Wednesday workshift tomorrow and possibly Thursday's harvest. Maybe there really is something wrong with me...

Monday, June 15, 2009

Fiddle-Dee-Dee

So I can’t stop picturing that scene from Gone With the Wind where Rhett figures out that Scarlet is lying to him about the success of her plantation. Just by looking at her hands he can tell that she has been out working in the fields and that she is acting like everything is okay to cover up the fact that she is only after his money- anything to save her beloved plantation, Tara.

Well, Rhett Butler, I guess you’d see right through me too. These are not “the hands of a lady.”  These hands are scraped and tan, and mud is so stubbornly embedded in the pores that even when I scrub at them it refuses to budge. They are aching and tired, and for now, they’re ready to go to sleep until tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day.

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

If Kale Could Talk

If kale could talk, it would tell you how it grows in six neat rows in the back of the field on the farm. It would tell you how it’s best when eaten the day it’s picked, sautéed in olive oil or raw in salads. But mostly, it would tell you the story of the women who came to work at the farm today. It would tell you the story of two breast cancer survivors, one who relapsed twice after she thought she was cured. It would tell you about a painter who taught English in Thailand during the War in Vietnam and about an environmental lawyer raising a four-year-old son.

Wednesdays are workshift days at the farm. Every Wednesday, six CSA members sign up to complete two of their volunteer hours. Today, I pulled weeds in the kale bed along with the women who signed up. Today, what we didn’t know was that as we worked on our hands and knees in the mud, a man was shot at the Holocaust memorial museum in Washington D.C. And as the painter told us about the day she heard Dr. Martin Luther King give a speech about freedom, we were unaware that a white supremacist was being rushed to the hospital, so that doctors could work to revive him, after he took the life of an innocent man.

Working in the kale, these women exchanged stories of the things that had made them strong. The lawyer talked about her struggle to earn equality in a workforce dominated by men. The breast cancer survivor who relapsed twice talked about her fight through chemotherapy and radiation, proudly cancer-free since the year 2000. I don’t want to say I’m happy I had cancer, she said. She was glad, though, that something had come along that made her rethink her life, something that made her realize what was truly important.

It was their life experiences, I thought, that made them strong. I was the youngest in the group, and I secretly wished for a day when I would have more life experiences to share. But there was something about them that let me know that experience alone is not what gives people strength. There was a certain passion for life that they possessed, a passion that couldn’t be marked by time. The murderer at the museum was eighty-eight years old.

After two hours, the environmental lawyer stood up and looked at the three beds we weeded. The kale stood out neatly where we had worked. We covered a lot of ground, she said, and we smiled. She wasn’t talking about the kale.

Monday, June 8, 2009

Strawberry Fields Forever


Where else can you pick them right off the bush on your lunch break?

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Grey Skies

Today it rained and water soaked my skin. We spent the morning harvesting for the afternoon member pick-up and after lunch I planted chives and sorrel in the herb garden. My hands were numb and my goulashes were covered in mud and by the time I left the farm at five the rain was still falling from the sky. I never appreciated a shower and a cup of tea this much.

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Dandelion Wishes

Cultivating spinach is sort of like picking a flower, only not just one flower but thousands, and not flowers but weeds. Since herbicides aren’t used on organic farms, all weeds need to be pulled out by hand or hoe. This week I cultivated two 350 foot-long spinach beds, and halfway through I picked a dandelion so I could blow its seeds into the wind and make a wish. I stopped believing in dandelion wishes when I stopped believing in the tooth fairy, but I like to think that one day one lucky dandelion will be the one to work. I was tired and I wanted to wish that all of the weeds in the world would disappear forever, but I quickly changed my mind. I remembered something I once heard, that weeds are only weeds until we find a use for them, and I thought of a world in which little girls never knew the glow of buttercups under their chins. But mostly, I changed my mind so I could keep wishing. If this one came true, there would be no more dandelions left to wish on again.