Un-original title. Week 4.

It's been a busy week since I last wrote - a trip to southeastern Iowa for a Practical Farmers of Iowa (PFI) field day, a full week at the farm including snow peas and broccoli coming on, 3 inches of rain and 2 bouts of hail, an amazing solstice party and prairie walk with Slow Food Iowa and a chance to accompany Jan to the Saturday Farmers Market in Mason City. We're 4 weeks into the internship and the days are absolutely flying, despite the fact that these are the longest days of the year. All this light means everything is growing like crazy, and it's a challenge to keep up with all the harvesting and weeding that needs to happen, especially when violent storms are thrown into the mix.

Thunderstorms were one of the things Eli and I were both really looking forward to when we started thinking about being back in the Midwest, but I had forgotten just how powerful and scary they can be when the conditions are right. Thursday night brought some really nasty weather to the area, including a half mile wide tornado that brought a lot of destruction and at least a couple deaths to Southern Minnesota. Albert Lea, one of the towns that had a lot of damage, is only about 60 miles north of the farm here and many of the vendors at the Saturday farmers market in Mason City come from Albert Lea to sell their stuff. Luckily none of those folks had damage, but they all seemed to kn0w someone who did. Shiver shiver down my spine.

No tornadoes here at the farm, but we had some amazingly powerful (and destructive) wind and rain. We sat outside after work on Thursday evening just transfixed by the pre-storm sky - it was a spectacular show of clouds and colors that gave me a little adrenaline rush just watching it. Slate grays, deep ominous blues, scalloped clouds rushing past, and finally just a solid wall of darkness about 8 pm. The thunder, lightning and rain started about 8:30, the hail about 9:30, and by 11 when we went to bed (wind eerily whistling through the cracks around the door) it was still blustering and blowing.

Friday morning brought much of the same sky conditions without the actual rain fall so we spent the first part of the morning trying to salvage what we could of the lettuce and spinach before it started storming again. Most of the greens were shredded by the hail and while it's still edible, Jan and Tim have super high standards for the aesthetics of their produce. They don't send out greens missing just the right hue of green, let alone leaves that are deeply bruised and tattered. These were the rows that were supposed to supply the next 3 - 4 weeks of CSA shares with leafy greens, so it is a pretty significant damage. Last week we put a pound of lettuce and a half pound of spinach in the boxes expecting to put the same in for the next few weeks. Not this week. But, no lives taken and no structures badly damaged which puts things into perspective.

This weather episode really highlights what I think of as one of the most important aspects of being a member of Community Supported Agriculture. Jan and Tim have already received the support (financial and moral) from 120 members that they needed to put into process the organic production of a lot of different kinds of vegetables. Because of this support, the 20 minutes of hail that basically wiped out the entire crop of lettuce and spinach won't ruin the season for the farmers. Sure, it's unfortunate, but the hail storm brings only a little bit of misfortune to 120 people instead of a devastating amount of misfortune to 2 people. Through the CSA model the financial risk of organic and sustainable food production falls to the wider community of eaters rather than just to the very narrow single household producing the food. When there is plenty, everyone gets plenty. When there is not so much, everyone gets not so much. It's a system that makes sense to me.

I had a chance to go to Mason City with Jan yesterday for both the farmers market and for a short meeting with some other local foodists about starting a Buy Fresh, Buy Local chapter in North Iowa. I'm still trying to wrap my head around what exactly a Buy Fresh Buy Local chapter does, but I think it essentially provides some communication tools - advertisements, directories, and other public recognition efforts - for people and businesses who produce and support local food and products. There are BFBL chapters all around the country who all use the same imagery (http://www.foodroutes.org/buy-fresh-buy-local.jsp) so it is partially an effort to be part of one larger alternative food systems networks out there. It was a really good chance to get to see some of the behind the scenes work that has to happen in order to build vital food communities, and I left the meeting feeling pretty jazzed.

My point in mentioning that meeting, which happened right after the market, is that I'm really starting to see why this kind of work has been quietly calling my name. I've had some really great (and some really not great) jobs over the last few years but I haven't found anything that fit just right. I loved The ReBuilding Center and my outreach work there, but it was oh so hard to sit an office much of the day. I loved connecting with and supporting my AmeriCorps members as an AmeriCorps Team Leader but it was oh so hard to deal with ever shifting climate of the social service agency we were with. I don't think I'll ever say that I loved waiting tables, but I really did like the active and inter-active nature of the work. I liked having a brisk pace and defined tasks to accomplish. I think I probably kept a restaurant job through both of my office jobs because I needed the variety in my day-to-day. That, and the AmeriCorps stipend leaves just a little to be desired.

I find work on the farm to require a real balance of physical and mental work, which is what I think has been missing in my employment situations so far. The office work didn't give me enough physical movement and human interaction and the restaurants didn't give me enough mental stimulation and variety. On the farm, there are the obvious physical chores that get done everyday - moving the chicken tractors, harvesting vegetables, building fences, weighing and prepping veggies for CSA boxes and market, planting, weeding, walking the fields and inspecting the crops, looking for growth, pests, any pruning needs. And, there is an endless amount to think and talk about regarding both the physical work of the farm and the mental work of addressing and changing food systems at a much broader scale. This is a big issue that includes a big number of players. There are academics, politicians, entrepreneurs, and everyday joe-schmoes like myself trying to find their way and their place in this conversation. There is a whole generation of children and young people who, for the first time in modern history, have shorter life expectancies than their parents, partially because of their diets and the food they have (or don't have) access to. There are thousands and thousands of acres of land that have seen nothing but corn and chemicals since the 1970s. There are so many issues around food and food systems that need both more small farmers and more voices. I know the two don't traditionally go together, but Jan and Tim are two folks setting a much different example, and it's pretty inspiring to be spending so much time with them. Sets a girl to dreaming big dreams. =)

I think that was a really long and ramble-y way to say that the longer I'm here the more I'm getting out of it, and the more my wheels are spinning. I'm not even remotely sure as to where those wheels are taking me, but for now the fact that they are spinning like they are is plenty.

We have a busy week coming up yet again with all the normal farm work plus a visit from my parents (hoooraaay! haven't seen them since Christmas), and a visit from Indy friends Forest and Alex. We're also planning to take an early day on Friday and head to Madison, WI to see Eli's sister and brother-in-law, Erika and Michael. Haven't seen them since their wedding last summer, so we are really looking forward to the week and connecting in person with so many excellent people we don't get to see very often.

Think dry thoughts for us, and much love to all!

Jan and One Step at a Time Gardens produce at the Mason City Farmers Market on Saturday morning.

Tim cleaning up some of the damage from Thursday night's storm. The picnic table was our daily lunch spot.


Capturing some sun.

Sunset on the prairie.

Couple of happy folk.

Brief notes and some photos

Well, mostly a photo blog this week, I think. It's been rainy and stormy here in Iowa which means some of the planting and other field work has been postponed, but it also means we've had time to do and talk about some of the behind the scenes work that happens here. It also means time for conversation with some of the other crew members - most notably the ultra conservative Regular Baptist (can anyone tell me what that means??) teenagers who work a couple of times a week. How to keep a level head when a 15 year old boy tells you a woman shouldn't been a minister because it's not a woman's role to teach??? He seems to take direction from our fearless female farmer just fine, so I sense some cognitive dissonance. Perhaps an issue to slowly and persistently address over the course of the summer.

CSA Boxes this week included lettuce, spinach, green onions and radishes. We just picked the first of the snow peas (below) for market tomorrow, and those will get included in next week's share. They are delicious - crisp, crunchy and just a little sweet.

Eli and I are headed to Clarinda, IA (southwestern corner of the state) tomorrow to attend an organic farm "field day" put together by the Practical Farmers of Iowa, a nonprofit that works to improve communication and knowledge sharing between Iowa farmers of all types. The farm we're headed to transitioned from conventional to organic corn and soy, and introduced a couple acres of veggies to their production as well. I'm looking forward to seeing another operation now that I have a fairly decent understanding of the one we're on. Hopefully I'll find some time and energy to report and reflect on how the weekend goes. In meantime we are sending lots of love!

Snow peas harvested for Saturday Farmer's Market.

One of the old, but still useful, farm buildings at OSTG. See the clouds in the windows?

The front pasture, lane, and East Twin Lake.

Row of lettuce just before harvest in the hoop or "high tunnel" house. Tomatoes on the right.

My current blogging and general communication location, until the the flatbed needs moving. =)

2nd Week Thoughts

I'm starting this blog post without a real sense of topical direction, so hopefully it doesn't get too ramble-y or nonsensical - but if it does, I hope it's at least amusing.

Yesterday marked two weeks of work done here at One Step at a Time Gardens and things are starting to feel a bit more rhythmic and routine, although not absolutely entirely. There is always a period at a new job when I feel kind of jittery and nervous - I don't know the lingo and acronyms thrown about, the names of key players in the field (literally, here!) or organization, how unkempt I can actually wear my hair, or where the toilet paper is kept. There is always new information coming at me, I feel like I should always have a question, and I am always a little freaked out that maybe they meant to hire somebody else but accidentally ended up with me. How many times is it okay to ask to be reminded about some small detail before they think I'm an idiot? How long before I can let my shoulders relax and just know what to do and where to be? The good news is I've had a lot of different jobs, which means a lot of time being the new girl, so those questions aren't really rhetorical: 3 times is an appropriate amount to ask the same question (but not in the same day!) and 3-5 weeks is a good amount of time to count on before near-total comfort in a job sets in. At 2 weeks down, I'm nearing the homestretch to confidence in my day-to-day responsibilities, and that is a good feeling.

Farm work really shifted last week as we moved into the first delivery week for the CSA and the first week for Farmer's Market in Mason City. We spent our first week on the farm transplanting, building a few tomato and pea fences, transplanting, weeding here and there, and transplanting some more. I'm a little foggy on the details since it was over a week ago, but I think we watered in (there's some lingo I learned! that means planted) something like 400 tomato plants, 300 peppers, 350 brassicas (broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage), and a whole whole bunch of summer and winter squashes. Last week we started actually harvesting produce that was planted way back in the fall and early early springtime, and boy did we glean a lot. Over the course of the week we harvested 1200 green onions, 50 pounds of spinach, and almost 70 pounds of head lettuce. We dug a whole bed of leeks and kept our fingers crossed for the radishes to ripen just in time, but they didn't cooperate. So, farm members received their first box this week without those lovely red globular vegetables that are ever so popular here in Iowa. (Are they popular other places? It seems a strange vegetable to be popular to me...) They did receive an absolutely beautiful and bright green array of lettuce, spinach, green onions and leeks along with the "weekly note" that Jan includes in each box.

The weekly note is an example of one of the things I think sets this farm and CSA apart from others we interacted with over the last few months. Jan takes a lot of time and care to make sure folks have the resources they need to be connected to their food on many different levels. The note includes a commentary on what is actually in the box, different suggestions for how to use it, perhaps a side bar on how it was produced, and she tries to also include a piece about different events, actions, people or organizations pertaining to food policy and culture, both regionally and nationally. This may mean highlighting a bill that is about to be put before Congress that will affect the regulations either conventional or organic agricultural producers must abide by (or put to wayside as conventional ag becomes less regulated). It may mean giving a shout out to a start-up coop in the North Iowa region. It may mean giving a brief review of a recently published food book or magazine article. It may mean highlighting the work and activities of one of the farm members in hopes of fostering connection and community among the folks who eat food from the same ground. The underlying point of the commentary section is always the same: encourage people to be more connected to their lifestyle choices, to their food, and to each other. Make eating (and living!) an informed and conscious activity.

This I am totally inspired by, and am diligently working to adopt as a regular practice of my own. It takes a lot of attention and effort, however, and I am as susceptible to laziness as the rest of my Millennial Generation. I know it sounds completely cheesy, but I really do just have to take it one step at a time, just like the name of the farm! I guess it actually turns out to be one trip to the farmer's market and one pound of bacon at a time, but who's policing terminology here? Ultimately I think the goal is to make conscious choices, even if they aren't always the correct or most responsible choices. We are a society and culture of consumers, that fact cannot (and maybe should not) be denied. That we consume is not a choice we make, but how we consume is a choice we make each and every day, whether we know it or not. I think many, many people don't realize that spending a dollar, any single dollar, is both making a choice and sending a message to those who operate within the free market. I know I don't always realize it, or at least don't always pay attention to it. Sometimes the cheap and convenient is just so damn cheap and convenient. Is an extra 5 minutes reading the label worth making my shopping partner even more terse and exasperated than he already is with my leisurely shopping self? ( I'm a woman who doesn't like shoe shopping or department stores, but put me in a grocery store and oh.man.watch.me.go.) So, I think the challenge is to be informed about where my money goes, who puts it in their pocket, and what they do with it. That's not always entirely possible, but the pursuit of that information is. It takes effort and energy and sometimes going without to make that pursuit and follow through with a purchase that feels good. And who wants to expend effort and energy EVERY TIME you make a purchase? Not me. But, practice makes perfect, and any routine can begin to feel normal after a while. That is the goal.

Oh boy. I am waxing a little too political even for my own 7pm and hungry for dinner brain. Being on this farm is giving me lots and lots and lots to think about, both by nature of the work and location and by nature of all the tiiiiiiiime I have here. It is lovely, but it can put the brain into overdrive. I think this is probably plenty for a Saturday evening.

Thank you so much to those of you who have commented or let me know otherwise you are reading. I know it seems impersonal and somewhat disconnected, but it means a lot to me to know those of you I love and care about are reading along and thinking and identifying. Eli and I think and talk about all of you often, so it's good to know the energy is being returned.

I'm still trying to find time to figure out a faster way to post photos (thanks for the Flickr tip, Uncle John...that's what I need to look into!) so still not many photos. Any specific tips and hints from other folks who have experience putting large photos onto a blog quickly would be appreciated. Much love to everyone!