Week 2

Rooted

Agriculture is a human/nature relationship. Sometimes the relationship is like a newly infatuated couple, puppy love, when the plants are growing 2 inches a day (by that definition I am in love with my basil) and just the right amount of rain comes at just the right time. Other times, Nature plays the one roommate who doesn't do their dishes. 

And just like any relationship it builds over time. But agriculture's time scale is far too large to be kept by a wrist watch or even the shiny-new Facebook timeline (you knew I couldn't go a week without curmudgeon-ing about social media).

Agriculture keeps time with roots. 

For a plant to grow it needs roots and, generally speaking, the healthier the roots the healthier the plant. When the above ground part of a plant goes away the roots generally remain. They decay into more soil. They become the land. Good farming practices make use of this fact by planting cover crops, crops meant to grow and be turned back into the soil, to build their soil structure. 

Human roots often are less tactile. Human roots grow on the timescale of generations. They build up the "culture" in agriculture. Human roots live through traditions of language, music, recipes, buildings, and stories. I have realized recently is how easy it is to tell how "traditional" a certain food dish is by it's ingredients. For example, a traditional Irish dish called colcannon is made with potatoes and kale. You can tell it is actually "from the old world" because the ingredients were attainable to the people who lived in Ireland long ago: both grow in that climate and both are ready to harvest at roughly the same time. 

Traditional cuisine, like other cultural heritages, is firmly rooted in their place. There isn't much citrus in Norwegian cuisine because there isn't much citrus grown in Norway. This makes me wonder: if traditions are born of a certain place, what happens to them when they leave that place? 

Living and working at the farm means I must learn about both of these types of roots, natural and human. 

I have learned that learning has costs. College obviously costs money. Many believe too much money given the importance of the college degree in today's society. It is a complicated issue. In fact, the cost of learning is embedded in many of our cultural sayings: "No pain, no gain" or "Always learn from your mistakes" to name a few.

My friends and I and our peers can all see the light at the end of our college careers. The “real-life” light. For most of us we see two choices work or more school. To me the cost of learning about roots is time. It feels as though whatever decision I make at the end of this tunnel will be a long-term commitment. Work OR more school. My decision to farm next season and learn about roots will "cost" me time.

Natural roots and human roots; the pursuit of knowledge of both is agriculture. And that is well worth the cost.

I am the fourth generation in my family to live on this land. Great-grandparents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, parents, and now my cousins and I. That's a lot of roots. A lot of roots to learn about, experience, live up to, respect, be proud of and to add my own part to. 

As young person I struggle, should I be attempting all these "rooting" activities? Should I be asking my doctor if I am healthy enough for "rooting"? Does this path lead me away from my peers to an isolated place in the country where I complain about "kids these days" and the interwebs? Is now the right time to be doing this? After all, I've got my whole life ahead of me and I know I'm not done with college learnin'. More things to think about. 

For now though, I think I'll just walk the land, check my roots, then head to bed. 

- Eric