I wrote the below newsletter early in the pandemic and at the time I thought better of sending it out. I didn’t want to offend anyone (is “sudden consideration” one of the early signs of a COVID infection?) Now that sufficient time has passed I feel it is a good time to finally publish it. I wouldn’t want something this good to go to waste. That and the fact it is so busy this time of year that I don’t have time to write a new newsletter. I edited the parts that were time sensitive (like what we are having this week) so those areas are for this week. So without further ado, please sit back and enjoy this newsletter from a long ago era.
Is there ever a bad time to tell a good joke? I was reminded this week of this quote I just made up when I communicated with one of our (formerly) potential new members. Find out the answer to this question after a few brief messages.
(There are no brief messages this week. Carry on).
We farmers have to use all our senses to be successful. Our sense of sight is used to scout for pests and diseases. Our sense of touch is used to determine ripeness of tomatoes. Our sense of smell allows us to find produce that may be compromised. Our sense of taste is used to ensure what we grow is as tasty as it can get. Our sense of hearing is used to figure out why the tractor is making that infernal racket. And finally our sense of humor is what gets us through each day and more importantly each season. Without this last sense the season would be a long, arduous slog. Without a sense of humor we would choose not to harvest your produce when it is 34 degrees and sleeting. Without a sense of humor we’d feel empathy for the worker who tripped while carrying a 60 lb bin of cabbage instead of laughing at them hysterically. And of course without a sense of humor the person carrying the cabbage would be offended by our lack of empathy.
I was reminded of our need for a good sense of humor during the past week when I got a message from someone who was offended by our PandemicShare offering. She called it “distasteful” and wondered if “this is how [I] spend my time.” Obviously she hasn’t been following the newsletters since writing them is where I am spend the bulk of my time. They take far longer to write than putting together a new share on our online store. I replied, “Seems to me this is the time we really need humor. Sorry it doesn’t work for you.” My apology for not taking her sensitive nature into consideration when creating PandemicShare was not met with what I expected to be an apology on her behalf for being overly sensitive. Instead she replied, “Humor definitely” which I thought was a good start; she agrees with me. But then she went on to say, “But I’ve taken my business elsewhere to reflect my feelings.” Which seemed to suggest she wasn’t going to apologize to me. Then she called me “Classy”, which I appreciated. I always stay classy. And wished me “Good luck to you in this new world.” At least we ended on a good note.
Maybe it is just me but I think humor is a helpful way to cope with life’s difficulties. It lifts us up when we are down. It takes our mind away from things that affect us negatively but may be out of our control. It allows us to realize that life goes on whether we are sad, mad, hurt, angry, frustrated, or any other negative emotion. We can sit around and mope all day. We can find slights to get angry about. We can be hurt by actions that were never meant to hurt us. But while we are doing this life just keeps marching on. Life doesn’t care if you are angry. Life doesn’t care if you are mad. It doesn’t care if you were disturbed by something you read. Life just keeps moving on, second by second by second. Tick, tick, tick.
So you can live your life being mad or you can live your life finding happiness. You can look for things to become annoyed at or you can find humor in the strangeness of life. Are pandemics funny? Not typically, though there was this one time… Anyway, typically not. But do we stew over it or do we do what we can and move forward? Do we become humorless or do we crack a smile and laugh a little? Does our whole life have to become doom and gloom due to a once in a lifetime, global pandemic that is killing millions of people and leaving others with debilitating conditions? (Well, if you put it that way…) Is it sacrilegious to laugh at our collective misfortune of being part of the human race? I say, “No, but I knew a guy…”.
This interaction got me thinking about where this farm fits into the world and I’ve reached the following conclusions: If life for you is a serious matter then we probably aren’t the right CSA for you. If you look for things to be offended by then we probably aren’t the right CSA for you. If you want a box full of kale we probably aren’t the right CSA for you. But if you like to laugh, you find humor in the world and you are indifferent to kale, we are right up your alley. Ok, maybe we sometimes put a bit more kale in the shares than people would prefer but think of it as edible packing peanuts to protect the other produce.
The bottom line is that Fresh Earth Farms provides not just food to nurture the body but also humor to nurture the soul and occasionally knowledge to nurture the mind. If your soul is already at its humor capacity and needs no more nutrition then I hope you find a farm that is humorless and dour. You would fit right in. In the mean time I will be offering PandemicShare, WeedShare, StoneShare and SarcasmShare to those who want pandemics, weed, stones and sarcasm, as well as those who just want to laugh once in a while. And maybe in a future newsletter I’ll relate the story about the time I brought down the house with laughter at my father’s funeral. There really is never a bad time to tell a good joke.
What will we have this week?
Good question, thanks for asking. We have a few bok choi left. I’m sure there is someone among us who hasn’t had their fill of bok choi. New this week is fennel! See below for a few details on fennel. We also have some kohlrabi, some summer squash/zucchini, some eggplants, some lettuce, some broccoli (not the best looking broccoli due to the heat), some beets the deer missed (though the beet tops aren’t looking the best due to insect damage), some okra, some kale, some green onions, oh, oh, oh, some tomatoes!, some basil, and maybe some other things as well. We seem to have small to medium amounts of a lot of different things. Makes box packing challenging.
Flowers and Coffee shares this week. No other add-on shares.
Fennel
What the heck is this strange, alien looking vegetable in my share this week? Well, you’ll have to be a bit more specific since it could be either fennel or kohlrabi. Fennel is the vegetable that smells delicious — if you like the smell of licorice. Kohlrabi doesn’t smell like licorice so it should be easy to tell it apart. Most people are familiar with fennel seeds used as a spice. The fennel we grow is bulbing fennel. This fennel grows a “bulb” at its base that is used as a vegetable. You can also use the fronds — the frilly things attached to the fennel bulb.
Fennel bulb has a texture similar to celery. To use it cut it up like Martha Stewart does in this video. (It will only take 47 second of your life to learn this valuable life lesson!) Then cook it up with a bunch of other veggies, put it over pasta and call it dinner. You can use the fennel fronds to make a deliciously sweet pesto. Or use some of each in a salad, or a salad, or a salad with or without oranges. There are so many uses! Be brave and give it a try!
Well that’s more than enough for now. As always, send in your questions, comments, jokes, new product ideas and anything else you think would be useful for our fellow members.