Greetings CSA Members! Shelby’s wonderful writing in last week’s newsletter was, for me, the perfect antidote to the kind of semi-frantic, all-over-the-map kind of thinking I’ve been doing over the past several weeks, even months. Shelby reminds all of us- especially me(!)- that the baseline reality of Featherstone Farm is found in the day-to-day, often repetitive and back breaking work of planting, tending and harvesting vegetables in the field. Recently, this has been all the more difficult with persistent heat and sunshine; when it’s crazy muggy and steamy hot, crops mature faster and require more work, not less.
There is just no way to overstate the debt of gratitude that we all owe fieldworkers… not just at Featherstone Farm, but in agriculture nationwide (and beyond!).
The day-to-day experience of Featherstone Farm early summer 2020 for me as owner, has been not so grounded in this kind of reality (with the exception of the handful of days I’ve spent picking kale, strawberries and broccoli with the crew). I’ve soaked through many T-shirts with sweat, no doubt. But much of my physical work has not been in the field, but on building and plumbing projects, to upgrade housing facilities for employees in a time of social distancing (and for the general welfare of the many people who use the break room and shop as part of their daily grind). In a way, this is the most satisfying work a guy like me can do, supporting employees who are busting their butts for the farm every day. Plumbing stinks (literally!), but I actually view it (sometimes!) as a kind of sacred service to people who make my life- all of our lives- immeasurably richer with their dedicated labor.
A good deal of my time recently has been spent trying to reconcile the sharply contrasting “split screen” realities I feel as I contemplate the world we live in. Simply put, in a time in which global pandemic, social upheaval and yes, global climate change make the world more and more stressful for the vast majority of humanity, life has basically never been better at Featherstone Farm. How could this be???
I’ve written lots and lots in this newsletter over the past several years, describing the second reality as it’s unfolded at our small farm business. So I won’t spend much time on this part just now (not that it isn’t still so important!). Suffice it to say that, as our farm team remains in place year after year, building skills and judgement, everything is getting better and easier every year; soils, crops, CSA boxes and outcomes across the board. It helps that we’ve had more “normal” (read: less) rain this spring and early summer. As I started out writing, kudos to the Featherstone Farm team- all 40 of them, English and Spanish speakers, men and women, young and young at heart- that are making 2020 such a successful year, despite the heat. Thank You!!
It’s the first part of the split screen that I’ll write about mainly here, because this is the part that has been preoccupying me so much recently. How does it feel for me, as a 25 year veteran farmer, to see Featherstone Farm in such a solid, happy place, even as the world around us seems to be coming apart at the seams? In a word: dizzying.
Literally for decades, the split screens have been reversed: the economy booms, America seems to be making progress toward social and even economic justice… and Featherstone Farm flounders. Health emergencies on the farm, acute and chronic weather events (equally destructive), toxic growth in scale and ambition followed by upheaval in the farm team, immigration issues and shifting land tenure and through it all, mounting debt; I think most of you are well familiar with lots of this story. Suffice it to say that it’s taken a toll on my family, and on what little hair I have left on the top of my sunburned head.
Now however, we seem to be getting our act together here on the farm, just as the veil of stability seems to be lifting elsewhere. Bizarre timing, for sure.
I got into agriculture 30+ years ago with an activist mentality and zeal. It was a quick pivot for me from protesting Apartheid South Africa and the Contra war in Central America, to advocating for systemic change in the food system by starting an organic vegetable farm. I carried much (too much!) of this mentality into the first two decades at Featherstone Farm; while daily operations lurched up and down and debt mounted 2010-2014, for example, I made at least 4-5 trips to Washington DC to advocate on farm policy, on immigration reform, and especially on the need for urgent action to reduce carbon (climate change).
When we nearly lost the farm in 2016 due to epidemic, climate-driven crop disease, I vowed (to all farm employees and creditors, and especially to my family) to cease and desist this advocacy work until the farm was back on its feet. Well now I can safely say that Featherstone Farm is back, certainly stronger, more stable and sustainable than it’s ever been. And as the world around us seems to be moving the other direction, I’m once again contemplating my role- and Featherstone Farm’s role- in being the change we want to see in the world.
I think it’s time to get active again, not just planting carrots and fixing the plumbing. But this time around, I’m going to be more prudent, more humble in the issues I take on.
My family and I have been part of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Winona for 20 years. One of our favorite presenters there over the years has been Vince Hatt, the vastly wise (and funny!) director of the Francescan Center for Spirituality (I believe once/ still associated with Viterbo University in LaX?). Vince has provided a roadmap for personal (if not farm business!) engagement in a turbulent world, in 4 deceptively “easy steps” that I often turn to for guidance: (1) show up (2) pay attention (3) speak your truth (4) don’t be too attached to the outcome.
For those of you who are curious how I think these steps apply to (and will guide) my work- and to some degree Featherstone Farm’s work- in an era of pandemic, of George Floyd and Donald Trump, of continuing suicidal carbon emissions- keep your eyes posted on our blog. I will be writing more on this over the weekend. The time for “white farmer silence” may be over.
For those of you who are simply content with wonderful kohlrabis and fennel bulbs in your box, however, I will knock off on this for now. There is a bounty of sweet corn, high tunnel tomatoes and fat, sun drenched melons on the way in your boxes, thanks again to the men and women who hit the field every morning at 5:30, to fill bins before the heat index hits 100.
As for me, I’m “a goin’ back out ‘for the rain starts fallin’”
Gratefully,
Jack
p.s. here are some harvest photos of the crew from around the farm the past few weeks:
Napa Cabbage Harvest
Zucchini Harvest
Broccoli Harvest
