Author: Horton Road Organics

I have been thinking about failure this week.

Earlier this week, I was called out for being too slow harvesting a certain crop. Something i’ve been slow at pretty consistently, despite taking all the advice i can on speeding up.
Feeling like i’m trying to do my best, and then being told it’s not good enough, is a tough pill to swallow. I started thinking, “do i even want to be a farmer?”

I spent over half my life in the same industry, if not the same job. I started doing theater in high school. By college, I was spending half my time studying sociology and half my time working in the theater department lighting shows.
I never really meant to do lighting for a living. I went to college thinking i was going to be a social worker. After college, I spent a year doing americorps, volunteering in louisiana and mississippi after katrina.  But i kept going back to theater. And then, I expanded out into also doing television and events such as fashion shows. I liked that as a stagehand, I could always be doing something new, but the basic principles were the same. I learned all i needed to know about how to troubleshoot electrical issues in my first year doing lighting in New York, and then i just scaled up over and over.

There came a time when i no longer felt engaged with what i was doing. I stopped wanting to keep moving up the chain to the bigger and better jobs. I started wishing I could do something to improve the planet instead of being in such a wasteful industry. I loved working with my hands and being outside. Thus, farming. (this is the short version of a story that took about 5 years to come about)

So here we are, and I’m not that good at anything. It’s understandable. I’m an apprentice. I essentially have 3 months of experience in this job.

But i am not that young anymore. And it feels harder to be bad at something after having a decade+ career in a field where i was sought after, because i was good at what i did.
So sometimes i think, should i just go back to new york? should i just go back to my old job? And i know the answer. Both in theory and in practice, because i went back last winter and worked for a month after spending last year wwoofing on the west coast. It was nice to be somewhere familiar, to do something i’m good at. But at lunch i would stare out the window and wish i could see trees.

I remind myself that i like a challenge. That it’s good to be learning new things. That i’m building towards expertise in this new field.

And I’m not going to quit now. What if next week, it finally clicks and i figure out how to be as fast as i need to be? Plus, how satisfying is it going to be to get to October and know that I was an integral part of making things happen here at Horton for 2019.
I know that i have already grown since getting here. i know that i have a better understanding of the ecosystem of farming, and i have had the opportunity to have a hand in each step from seed to harvest. I have 3 more months to learn and grow. I guess we’ll all find out together where i’ve gotten by the end of October.

 

 

Amanda is a 35 year old New Yorker at heart who relocated to Oregon a year ago to try her hand at farming.

Hello Friends!

It has been a busy week here on the farm with lots of new crops to harvest, days full of work, and evenings full of deep rest. Yesterday we harvested garlic which last year’s apprentices planted in the fall. It was probably one of my favorite farm moments thus far. I love to harvest (and eat) any sort of root. Something about the process of unearthing, of hands covered in dirt makes me feel so whole and real. there is magic in holding a mature crop in your hands after trusting the earth with a seed, giving water and time, trusting the sun with his light, and the moon with her night. It is so beautiful and so right. Farming as a daily ritual has given me the space keenly observe the many cycles of life within me and without me. The moon has been rising later into the night, and I see her through my window when I open my eyes with the sunrise, when just last week she was singing me to sleep every eve. The butterflies I see have changed, more little white ones these days. We move around the farm day to day in a sort of dance listening to the call of the crops who are ripe and ready to reap. Here in this quiet place, I get the chance to observe the way things change- constantly. Somehow slowly and rapidly all at once. As the plants grow, I grow. As the moon wanes and sheds her skin, so do I in my own way. As each new day breaks, and the sun rises to touch the plants, so do I. I am grateful.

Lily

Lily Hanson is an apprentice this season at Horton Road Organics. She was born and raised in Bend Oregon. She loves to express herself through art. When she isn’t working it’s likely you will find her by the creek with her guitar.

Today the opening question to our work meeting was, “When does a plant become food?” Is it food once its harvested? Is it food once its been processed through the pack out? When does the direction and intention of the plant’s life become nourishment for other living creatures?

Some of the answers that were offered contained the preparation of the pack out and then the physical handing of the produce to a customer or CSA member. Others didn’t find a difference between the two, offering the idea that they can be simultaneously both without have to be one or the other. For me, the intention of growing the plant for food is where the direction of that plant’s life becomes nourishment rather than being. Placing the seed into the soil and knowing that whatever is produced from its life will be consumed by someone is growing food to me rather than tending to plants. In my relationship to this dynamic, there is a tricky line here: the plants I help grown on Horton Road Organics are similar to the ones I have growing in my apprentice bed, but I don’t consider them food. Yes, I will consume what they produce and I provide the care they need, but the intention in I planting them was to experiment and cultivate a relationship with their lives rather than growing food.

When do see plants become food? Is it the second you pluck an apple from a tree? Or is it the physicality of going to the market that marks their consumption? Is the mushrooms you forage down an old logging road? Or the CSA box you pick up Thursday evening?

Food for thought and happy ponderings,

Erika

 

I’m not a huge environmentalist. Not one of those preachy, save the environment is my primary goal type people. It’s not that i don’t care about the environment, but my main thing i care about is people. This is the narrative i told myself for many years.

I started using reusable grocery bags maybe 8 years ago. I started trying to carry my own coffee cup and water bottle probably 3 years ago. I was bothered by the amount of waste in my previous industry, and was looking for something more sustainable. But the Green New Deal really did open my eyes to the ways that our environment impacts the lives and incomes of people everywhere. And now, i think about the way that we are treating this planet a lot more often.

So for me, it was probably only about 5 months ago that i was walking through the grocery store with my reusable bag, and i realized that everything i was preparing to buy came in single use plastic.

Sure, i reuse my bread bags and snack containers, but the potato chips i love, the veggie sausage, the mushrooms!

My fellow apprentices are younger than me, and they’re more advanced in their awareness about plastic and avoiding it. We talk about things like whether it’s reasonable to make a glass greenhouse from old windows, and ways to avoid using plastic mulch. I really hope that the next generation of organic farmers finds more new and innovative ways to reduce their (our?) environmental footprint.

For me, it just occurred to me 3 days ago that if i’m going plastic free the rest of this month, i can’t buy bread, milk or yogurt, at least not the ones i’m used to getting. Sure, we reuse yogurt containers and bread bags, but this is an exercise in increasing awareness. I’m going all in.
The plan is that i’m going to learn how to make bread this week. I haven’t decided if i’m going to buy a yogurt maker or go without. And i’m either going to spend the extra money to get milk in a glass jar, or attempt to make oat milk. Not sure which just yet.

And this weekend i went to the store Marley’s Monsters in Eugene and bought reusable dish sponges and floss that’s not made of plastic.

Staying away from single use plastic is made easier by living on a farm. Much of my food comes from our jars of bulk dry goods and oils, and the rest comes from the fields. I do keep thinking, how plastic free could i have been when i lived in New York? I think i could have gone a lot further than i did, with some extra thought and effort.

Today i read the how stuff works for how plastic is made, and recycled. I pondered the process for making paper and glass.  This month is only 9 days old, but my eyes are open. I think i am going to learn a lot this month.

 

What about you? Have you thought about the plastic you use and how you can use less?

 

 

Hey there! This week on the farm was dynamic, colorful, chilly, and full of dedicated work with the earth. We spend most mornings harvesting. On the solstice we plated flowers and prepared for saturday market. There have been so many hummingbirds, butterflies and field daisies to capture my attention throughout the day and fill my heart with gratitude. The days are long, but the bliss of having my hands in the dirt, and the rest after work is sweet. Summer is approaching and the promise of a big harvest and a healthy growth within all of us is rising with the season. Thank you June, may July be filled with sweetness.

Lily