Did I ever imagine that I would be in Farm School at 50 learning how to hand plant crops? No, but that has actually been a key component to my life; I’ve been guided often by impulse and gut feeling to try new things.
When I first heard about Farm School, it came at a time in my life when I had never considered it before. Today, studying farming feels so natural, fascinating, scary, and often intimidating. Plunging two fingers into the ground to make a hole big enough to drop a transplant in at the proper depth felt scary and awkward the first time I did it. Today, after a couple dozen feet of bed rows, it feels comfortable and familiar.
I realize that it is not necessarily “normal” to pivot into these types of lifestyle career changes, but it is something I have mastered doing throughout my life. I have worn a thousand career hats and built a legacy of experience and skills that uniquely prepare me for each new career adventure I undertake. The most exciting thing about farming for me is that it gives me the opportunity to bring all of my skills and experiences into a single stream of effort.
Farming is a challenging profession based on one’s ability to manage a constantly changing kaleidoscope of challenges. Farming asks one to be open to following general guidelines, but it requires that you be flexible, adaptive, and persistent. Things beyond your control and means are going to impact you, as a farmer, and you have got to be willing to meet the challenges as they come.
I was not raised in an agricultural family. I did not successfully grow things prior to starting down this path earlier this year. But I believe all those things I did do were preparing me to do this now; to be on my knees in the dirt poking two fingers into the soft ground to plant this little piece of life. All these years, I never realized I was simply gathering all the tools I would need to be a farmer in the second half of my life.
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