Heirloom

This week I read Heirloom: Notes from an Accidental Tomato Farmer by Tim Stark. Stark left a life as a struggling writer to become a struggling market farmer selling his produce at New York City's Green Market and to a bevy of New York's top chefs. I think I need to read it again: there was simply too much to take in. Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes, elderberries, the Amish, fingerling potatoes, groundhogs, chocolate Scotch bonnet peppers, more tomatoes.

The last chapter, chronicling the real estate squeeze that has driven farmers farther and farther from the city, hit me squarely between the eyes. As the daughter of a farmer with none of the family left in farming, these realities hurt me. And frighten me. Who will grow the food for my grandchildren?

So I garden. And I teach Skye. And I know that while I am happiest in my garden, this place will never be a farm. I will continue to go off to the library each day and collect my paycheck on the 15th of the month. I'm a coward. Farming is too hard. And we all rely on it every day of our lives.