sun rain soil: Earth Dance, Week #1

Wednesday
April 14, 2010

I first met Norm in January. We had agreed to meet at Dunn Brothers coffee shop; he on his way to his daughter’s volleyball tournament, and Willee and I on our way to Madison to visit relatives. I had called him a few weeks before that, asking him if I could work on his organic produce farm for the summer. He had told me that his paid positions were full but that, after meeting me, I might volunteer one or two days a week. I told him that I would love to volunteer in exchange for education and first-hand training that I might possibly be able to use on my own farm some day.

A month ago, Norm and I had agreed that today would be my first day to volunteer, as I had been able to rearrange my work schedule to accommodate this.

I left at 7 a.m. this morning for an 8 a.m. start, as I wasn’t sure how long it would take me to get there. Before I even got out of Rochester, I hit a major detour and had to turn around and backtrack before I was eventually on my way out of town.

I ended up getting there at 7:45, even with the detour and morning traffic.

But…..Norm wasn’t there, and even his exchange student (pronounced Eye-a), who answered the door, didn’t know where he was. She was kind enough to call him and found out that his wife, Laurie, had had car trouble, and he was helping her.

His instructions for me were to wander around the farm until he could get there, and as it turned out, I had a wonderful escort. Hannah, the farm dog, accompanied me everywhere I went. She is the sweetest dog and always wants to be petted, especially on her tummy. Norm arrived pretty quickly after that, and we got started for the day.

My first work was in the greenhouse, and even though it was April, the day was heating up (eventually close to 80), and I was very glad that I had dressed in layers, peeling down to my tank top.

I planted 7 flats of baby tomato seeds, called “Paragon,” and I labeled the flats with their name and the date. These flats were watered and went directly into the germinator (a refrigerator set up with heat) to get them started quickly.

Norm’s tractor needed repair, and a repairman made a house call to fix it. After I was done with planting the tomatoes, Norm and I rearranged all the other seedling flats in the greenhouse….peppers, cauliflower, chard, broccoli, tomatoes, sage, basil, etc.

All along so far, Norm had been intently watching me and paying attention to how I worked and how I reacted in different situations with different directions, etc. At this point, he came up to me and complimented me by telling me that he was impressed with how I took direction and also figured things out on my own using my common sense.

Then, Norm needed to work on some things in the house, and he gave me a new job. All the CSA boxes from last year were broken down and stored in the delivery van. Norm said they are switching to smaller boxes (from full bushel to ¾ bushel) this year, so he asked me to take all the old boxes and stack them up in the loft above his tractor. As different as that was from planting, I enjoyed it as well.

When I finished that job, it was just about noon and time to take a break and eat the wonderful lunch that I had brought with me. Hannah joined me on the grass under the shade of one of the trees in the front yard.

Willee had found me the coolest insulated container for salad and dressing, so I had a wonderful homemade lunch with my macadamia nut dressing. Hannah tried to get me to give her some of my lunch, but I knew she wouldn’t like it, so I told her no and to sit down….and she did!

While I was eating, I noticed a seed that had fallen from one of the trees had imbedded itself in the ground, and already a little shoot of a tree was coming up.

After I finished lunch, Norm took me up to let out the chickens and collect their eggs. He has a big ‘herd’ of gorgeous Rhode Island Red chickens. They were all waiting to be let out….they knew it was noon, the time when they usually get let out. Then, Norm handed me a basket, and I collected eggs out of the nests. Some chickens were still setting on their eggs, and they had to be taken out from under them. Norm collected those. Once of the hens pecked his hand, and the last hen cried like she was losing her babies...that was sad.

He told me that a critter had gotten into the hen house and killed a chicken and had broken a leg on another. He had this hen in a separate cage, trying to heal her, so the other chickens wouldn’t pick on her. She didn’t look like she was doing too well, and Norm wasn’t really sure what to do with her. He is thinking about splinting her leg.

I met the 3 horses and 1 ornery goat…when Norm let her out, she actually butted Hannah. I got out of there quickly, because I did not want to be butted, as this goat was quite large.

Norm gave me my next assignment which was removing straw packs from around the bottoms of his grape vines in his grape arbor and putting the straw near the lilac bush next to the small garden by the road. He told me I would accomplish this by using his John Deere tractor and a small trailer. He asked me if I knew how to drive it, and when I told him no, he proceeded to teach me how to drive it. At that moment, I was thinking about Bobbi and how she whips around on Dad’s John Deere in Pleasant Prairie all the time and how she drives the tractor at her church to do yard work, and I wondered why I never paid any attention to that kind of thing. Oh well, with Norm’s teaching and his trust, I was soon driving like an old pro.

Norm needed to go into town, and he asked me if I wanted to go in to see Spring Valley. I really didn’t want to go to town…what I really wanted to do was stay and work, and so that’s what I told him, and so he left, and I got to work.

I decided, since I was going to be working out in the sun, that I should put my long-sleeved shirt back on, and I also got my broad-brimmed straw hat that had a nice chin strap that held it in place in the gale-force winds we were having this day. It had also gotten quite hot, around 80, and so it felt like a good idea to protect my arms and face from the sun.

As in shape as I have gotten, it was a challenge walking up and down the grade of the little vineyard, gathering the straw packets and taking them to the trailer in the hot sun. Thank goodness for the wind, because it could have been a lot worse. I could fit straw gathered from around four of the vines before I had to drive the tractor to the lilac bush to dump the straw.

I had finished almost one of the four rows of vines when Norm came back from town. He checked in with me, and said something surprising to me. He asked me if I remembered when he had first met me and told me that he wouldn’t have hired me even if he had had an opening, in response to one of my answers to his questions….something about jumping into things and then not finishing them. Well, he told me that he was wrong…that he definitely would hire me! I told him that he didn’t know me at the time. It wasn’t too surprising a reaction to what I had said. I was just being truthful and being me when I answered, and I told him the problem with me isn’t that I’m not a hard worker (because I am!)….it’s that I just don’t know what I want to be when I grow up. He laughed, and I got back to work.

He told me that he was going to take his big red tractor (the one that had just been repaired this morning) and go up the road, about a mile, to a neighbor who he had promised he would till up his garden. So, he took off on his tractor up the gravel road and on over the hill, leaving a trail of road dust behind him.

Meanwhile, up in the sky, dark clouds were moving in, and it looked like we might be getting some rain soon.

Just after Norm left, a school bus pulled into his driveway and let off Adriana, Norm and Laurie’s daughter, and without seeing me, she went into the house.

I continued working, and I thought I was doing a pretty good job. The tractor and I were getting along (an X300 John Deere), and I was getting the straw moved.

Well, when Norm got back from his tilling, I found out that I had done something he had asked me not to do (although I couldn’t quite remember that he had said it)…I had covered the chives, instead of putting the straw on the grass. Well, what did I know? Grass, chives…they look pretty much the same if you’ve been living in the city for as long as I have! Well, now I know the difference between chives and grass, and I uncovered them all and put the straw on the grass. Norm said no harm done, because he usually mows the first crop down and uses the second growth for the CSA boxes, so that was a relief.

Very soon after that, it started sprinkling, so we finished up the last trailer load of straw and got both the tractors into the big shed, and then the rain came down in earnest.

While we were waiting for the rain to stop (because we could already see blue skies on the horizon), Riley arrived. He is a Spring Valley High School boy who works after school for Norm. What a nice kid, and what a lucky kid to have found a job like this, instead of having to work someplace like McDonald’s. Norm put him right to work, and then he asked me if I wanted to be done for the day…it was already 4:30.

He also had a favor to ask me. Laurie had gotten her car back and was at the Toyota dealer in Rochester picking it up, and she wanted Norm to bring Adriana into town, so that they could go shopping for jeans. Norm asked me, since I would be driving to Rochester to go home, if I minded taking Adriana and dropping her with her mom at the Toyota dealer. I certainly didn’t mind and said I would be happy to do it.

But, it suddenly struck me how trusting of me he had been all day. The very first job I had today was planting a huge portion of what would be his tomato crop. How did he know that I would do it correctly? He didn’t watch me…he just trusted me. He totally trusted me with his John Deere….what if I had ground the gears, learning how to drive it? But, he left several times while I was using it, and he trusted me. And now….he asked me to take his daughter to Rochester. I was amazed and honored. I can only imagine how wonderful this summer is going to be.

When we were waiting for Adriana to come out, Norm was telling me that Willee and I are welcome any time to come out and visit. He also told me that if I ever want to come out and work on Saturdays, when Willee is busy, that I was welcome to do that.

So, I confirmed I would be back on next Wednesday at 8 a.m., and Adriana and I left for Rochester. What a nice surprise on that drive to find out what a sweet girl she is. She told me she had been home schooled for a while when they lived in the Twin Cities, and now she goes to Spring Valley public schools. Her older brother is at Luther College. She said that she loves living on the farm and that while she isn’t forced to work, she is allowed to work for pay, and she really likes that.

When we got to the Toyota dealer on 63 in the midst of all the new businesses in that area, I got to meet Laurie. She seemed very happy to meet me, and was quite upbeat and positive.