No doubt you have been wondering why a fellow such as me, handsome, urbane, talented and most of all deluded, would choose to spend his Octobers bouncing around on a wagon full of straw, indulging my inner agriculturalist. Simple, it’s fun.
This meets the priority I have set out for myself as I have gotten older and wiser: whatever I do must be fun. Life is just too short to waste doing things you don’t enjoy.
Anyway, back to the farm. I spend my Octobers working at Waterman’s Farm Market leading tours at the Fall Harvest Festival.
Now, I don’t want to turn this into a free ad for my place of employment, and I don’t want to insult any of the other good, sincere pumpkin providers in central Indiana. But I will tell you that this job meets another requirement I set for myself: doing things that are of some good for people. I’ve never been shy about doing what I wanted for my own selfish reasons, but now I want to do for others when I can, especially since the big green bean company cares about the green, and not mostly the bean.
I grew up in the country, in LaGrange County. We knew what it meant to eat well, and the source our good eating was about 50 feet out our back door. We knew the delights of fresh-picked produce, all picked minutes before we sat down to eat.
Typical story, I never really realized how good I had it until I left home and fell into the world of high sodium and fat contents, tongue-twisting preservatives and mysterious sources in the food I ate.
In time, I became so disgusted with the quality of the food-like substances I was consuming that I sought out something that would take me back to the good, clean fresh food. In a long and roundabout way, that led to me to telling people where their food comes from and why it is best to eat local. It doesn’t have to be 50 feet out the back door, but in the area is just as good.
I found lots of people who wanted to eat that way but didn’t know where to begin. And that is why I spend Octobers bouncing around in a wagon telling people about farming. Well, and because it’s fun.