Kross Farm - I grew up on a mixed farm; beef and cash crops.
I was immersed in multi-generational farm life. My cousins and I learned to garden beside my Mom and Grandma. Just after he made a harness for our poor goat Agnes to pull us kids in the wagon, my Grandpa taught me how to put the bridle on a horse like a proper “Scotsman” not the “bloody English”. My cousins and I all wound up wearing bread bags in our rubber boots after a dunking in the slough while “sailing” on my Dad’s and Uncle's childhood raft they built with old logs sourced from around the farm.
I grew up being shaded by the very trees my Great Great Grandfather planted shortly after starting the farm with his son.
I grew up riding on the open air swather asking my Dad if he ever got bored riding over the same land, multiple times a year, year after year. I remember this vividly. I was sitting on the floor with my feet on the first rung of the ladder, holding out my hand to catch the heads of grain in my hand as they moved past me.
My Dad's answer that day changed how I looked at our farm and it shaped my future desire to return to the farm and follow in the foot steps of my fore fathers.
He said “how could I ever be bored Kim?”
Look - they just turned on the jets at the golf course. Look, a family of deer was laying over there. Look at that hawk diving for it's lunch. The leaves have their backs to the wind again so we should get rain soon.
I looked around, felt the hot prairie winds in my hair as we inched back and forth across that field and saw, really saw, the farm.
We were in the field that is right beside my garden so it shares the same view I have from my gardens now. A view I am as familiar with as I am the backs of my hands.
He was right!
How can you ever be bored watching the land your family has farmed for more than 100 years?
Farming means you get to watch plants grow. It means you get to watch the land shift and change through seasons and over time intimately. It can be stressful. It can be physically demanding. It can be exhausting and relentless.
There is nothing else I'd rather do!
Look at all this bounty and beauty!
Comments