Experiencing Life in a Farming Family

It’s still October as I’m writing my November blog. Many are enjoying pumpkin patches and apple picking. Cider, donuts, cozy sweaters, and hayrides fill the weekends and crisp mornings become the new normal. Harvest is also here and boy do the farmers work endlessly to get it done. While the work is so important to not just them, but also, you know, the global food source, it requires sacrifices.  

I love my farmer. He’s super self-motivated and dedicated. After meeting his parents, I could really see why. While it meant his soon-to-be bride had to wait until after planting season to get married, my farmer’s dad decided to pursue farming the same year he was to be married. 42 years and a choice to chase the endeavor paid off. By the mid-nineties, he was a full-time farmer and they were raising four kids. While the time it takes to farm meant he was away a lot, his fiercely independent wife held down the fort. The invaluable lessons from having a hard-working father along with the family support they had stuck with each kid. Two of them followed their father into farming while the other two have been successful on their own paths.

My 1st year as a farmer’s significant other was interesting, to say the least. Pinning down a farmer on a sunny day between April and October is pretty impossible. I spent most of my pregnancy sick and was due the second week in October. It was so much added stress to an already stressful time.  

This is my 2nd harvest season. Often my mother-in-law wisely reminds me to just go with the flow. After 42 years, she knows a thing or two. Right as always, things happen while your farmer farms and you just have to live life. Seed corn harvest meant Randy missed the first day of kindergarten for Skylar and the first day of preschool for Silas. The commercial corn farmers have seeds to (eventually) feed cows for dairy and meat, though. Soybeans have to be trucked and delivered for thousands of products, even if it means he works through back problems or little sleep. Planting wheat will mean 10 pm dinners while missing bedtime. It is hoping for rainy Sunday’s and dry weekdays. It is literally risking his life because people don’t think about how to approach farm equipment on the road, or how much room it takes for a semi to stop. Farmers put everything on the line for your food and my food and the food that feeds livestock. This is just crop farming. We won’t start talking about how thankless animal or dairy farming is and they don’t even get to slow down in the winter. Although, they used to have animals, too.  

While this is all hard, the benefits outweigh the difficulty. They are doing God’s work while giving the kids we have lessons they wouldn’t otherwise learn. Missing my farmer makes my heart grow fonder. It makes the time we do spend as a family more sacred to us. His mom gets Sunday lunch with her sons and grandkids that live locally. She gets to host Grandma Camp with private touch a tractor capabilities for her Bostonian grandson annually. This year that family farm hosted an elegant wedding that frankly shocked us all in how beautiful and dream-like it was, and a 1st birthday party for the youngest grandson. All of this is possible because of farming.

Next time you see a farmer on the road, give them space and don’t try to pass while he’s also passing a mailbox. Eat your tofu or cheeseburger and thank a farmer.