Farmers Are Cool
I fully realize that me writing the title "Farmers Are Cool" does not make it so. But that's not because it's not true. It is true. Or it can be. And it needs to be.
What makes something cool? What is that tipping point? Is it something in the attitude of the current teen generation? Or is it more classic than that, more pervasive, broader in generational scope?
It may seem like a frivolous question, but what we uphold, culturally, as "cool" is given priority of attention. And farmers and farming are desperately in need of priority and attention. Creating the mystique of "cool" around farming could literally save all of our lives.
When I was in high school and college farming was decidedly un-cool. As I made decisions about what I would study, about what direction I wanted to point my life, farming wasn't even on the list of options.
I grew up around dairy farms and the semi-self-sustaining farms of the Mennonite and Amish in central Pennsylvania. So as a young person, farmers looked like the American Gothic couple and smelled like manure. I was young, creative, hedonistic, ambitious (still am 3 of those 4), so there was nothing desirable in the isolation, hard manual labor, self-denial, and smells I experienced as my local farmers.
I completely lacked imagination.
If I had been able to remove the packaging from the package, it might have dawned on me that farming is almost perfectly aligned to my interests and values. Looking back with all the self-knowledge of hindsight, I realize that farming is a path with so many commendable aspects and so many bodies of knowledge that have been and continue to be fascinating to me, that I likely would have enjoyed taking that path at least as much as the path I've taken, if not more.
I love/d being outdoors. I love/d learning about nature. I love/d preparing delicious meals with fresh and interesting ingredients. I love/d using my body, building strength, getting sweaty & dirty. I love/d being productive every day in a way that is tangible. I love/d nurturing plants and animals and fostering health. I love/d problem solving. I love/d knowing how systems work, being self-sufficient. I love/d knowing where my food and drink comes from.
But farming was un-cool. So instead of using all of the above as my means of making a living, I graduated with a liberal arts degree and worked in office jobs in a city.
Don't get me wrong. I've lived large and made my life interesting. I'm grateful for the opportunities I've had and I've tried to take full advantage of them. I don't regret the life I've lived... but I do regret not being a full-time farmer.
Farming doesn't have to take the form of stinky Puritanical masochism that so many of us, naturally, rejected in our youth.
In Los Angeles there's Ron Finley, the "Ganster Gardener," who has literally built a farming culture on the streets of South Central LA, despite having warrants for his arrest for doing so.
There's Apricot Lane Farm, the subject of the amazing film "The Biggest Little Farm." They built a paradise at the outskirts of Los Angeles using holistic, regenerative agricultural practices that can be an inspiration and model for farms everywhere. When they started they knew nothing about farming. It took them ten years, braving coyotes, firestorms, and bankruptcy.
Farming is for risk-takers, creative people with vision, adventurers.
Some of the most brilliant people I know are grape and marijuana farmers. These kinds of agriculture have such high stakes that it attracts some very cool scientific minds.
Viticulture is, of course, one of my favorite forms of farming. Growing the vines to make wine is as rewarding as having the wine to drink as part of it.
I got into marijuana farming in college. Whenever I discovered something consumable that I loved, I wanted to learn how to produce it.
Our entire, American, culture is designed to make you into a mindless consumer because it is thought that will benefit business enterprise (and perhaps it does, but only in the short term). Being a farmer is a choice to instead be a mindful producer. Being a farmer is actually counter-culture.
Farming psychedelics is another form of farming that I didn't consider when I was younger. Growing mushrooms (even the non-psychoactive kind) is highly technical, and fascinating. Growing Peyote and San Pedro cacti is uniquely specialized. Ayahuasca is an agricultural product, made of a blend of grasses, vines, and barks that can be farmed.
In the modern world we have gained a global mindset, but we've lost the intimate connection we once had to the place from which we actually grow. We are truly ignorant of the most fundamental knowledge about ourselves.
For those who want to re-learn this, you have to unearth a secret, hidden knowledge. You start with something that catches your attention, sparks your joy, and follow it down the rabbit hole. One day you're licking the drips from an ice cream cone, and before long you'll find yourself on an orchid farm in Madagascar by way of helping a cow give birth in New York.
That journey will show you the great connection every one of us has to farming, and the immense impact farming has on not only our personal well being, but on the health of the entire planet.
The great news is that there is huge opportunity right now in farming, because most of it is being done wrong. We are reaping the health and environmental issues that come from decades of poor farming, and we need an entire generation of caring youth to realize there is a better way.
So this is a warning to a generation of young people who are considering their future. Don't be narrow-minded and blinded by prejudice when it comes to farming. It will only make your life smaller. It will only make you less cool.
***
Please use this form to join our mailing list if you want to support positive change in wine and the world, as well as be the first to get access to our new wine releases and special offers.