Farm stories are like tax returns...no wait come back, it gets better!
I was just going to say that I was musing the other day about the need to put a little distance between me and some of the stories I’d like to tell from my early years at Old Plank Farm. Something like 3-7 years, or about the length of time one hangs onto one’s tax returns. So many events, from mundane to embarrassing and everything in between, are woven into this farm’s history with hardly a second thought. Until, years later, I step back in my mind and remember some of the things that have shaped this farm. More often than not, I now find my memories of the early years to be amusing or at least enjoyable, although that’s not always how I felt when living through those times. The change is not in the memory itself, but in the time passed and the growth along with it. If tax returns are meant to be saved for 3-7 years before being thrown into the trash then farm stories are best saved for a similar time before being thrown out into the world.
This collection of very short stories that I have started and will share here one at a time in the coming weeks has little to do with the day-to-day happenings at Old Plank Farm (you can continue to find current events in our weekly newsletter and the “Announcements” section of our website’s Bulletin Board). These are like snap shots taken during the farm’s early, most formative years. They are short and easy to read, sometimes rough around the edges, and drawn up in no firm order from the first 12 years of Old Plank Farm.
I’ve hesitated before to start something like this because I am first and foremost your farmer, committed to excellence and expertise as an organic grower. What good would it do to tell you about the rootbeer incident or Potato Saturdays or toilet paper weed or bringing Lucy home or any number of events that dot our lives on this farm? I sincerely hope that the vegetables we grow--last year, this coming year, in all future seasons--are the best you’ve eaten and that what you receive from us is truly excellent and adds to your healthy lifestyle. That is the purpose of Old Plank Farm and is the ongoing focus of my work here. The harvest side of this life is what we offer you each week in the form of a CSA box filled with vegetables. But the farm side of life here is yours to share in too, if you wish to read my weekly newsletter column. To do so, please sign up for our newsletter using the form at the bottom of our Home Page.
My memory is considered irritatingly sharp by some people who know me (Yes, Ralph, I still remember your bank account password...I can’t help it, don’t tell me things!). Nonetheless, my first story wrestles with the nature of memory itself and some of its inevitable flaws. In this way I’ll tumble down the proverbial hill right off the bat, from which point I can get up and go just about anywhere. And I will. Every story is a product of my memory, my experience, my perspective, and the occasional written record or photo. I’ll change some names, as a respectful storyteller often does, even though I hope that many of the people who have colored the seasons here would enjoy being included in the collection.
Next Week: ‘Remembering the Door’.
