Autumn Falls

It's November and I've failed to capture the incredible beauty and reflective nature of another New England fall. It is so nie to have a time of year when food is plentiful, when each weekend brings yet another harvest festival - as a farmer for a moment my life feels tied into the greater societal conscience. Mostly. there are still the people who come to market and ask if we still have tomatoes on October 22nd, or worse, ask if we have bananas or avocados. but there is this moment in which much of the public know the time of year: it's harvest time!

On a year like this, after all the heavy rains of June and the late blight of July, it is truly remarkable to see that anything survived. and yet there they are - the carrots which Nate and I made a tight call and decided to flame weed just a bit on the late side, which we thought about plowing under because they came up so thin, which incredibly have filled out and turned into gigantic, long fiery tapers of sweet orange crunch. The cover crops start filling out the pathways between rows of fall brassicas. the fall brassicas that we transplanted on a rare sunny day in june...but still after several inches of rain, as 4 students, 2 incredibly persistent visitors who volunteered, and I trudged through six inches of mud, each step a struggle against the suction, have finally produced broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and romanesco.

The students graduated in mid September. We had a ceremony in the barn and I read "To be of Use" by Marge Piercy - I love that poem.