A little surgery on the 1976 camper top, before we added some timber framed supports.
All last week, and maybe even the week before that, I was bracing myself. It wasn’t just in anticipation of all the emails, calls, texts, visits and support we’ve been getting from our kickstarter campaign. Another storm was brewing. That storm arrived from the west on Monday evening, pulling up to our farm in a small green Honda. Out stepped Kayla, our full time crew member. We’ve been worried about our tight and cluttered barn space, how to manage another person, when Mary and I sometimes, at our scale of production, are working hard to just manage ourselves .
I feel like the stakes are high. We’ve just finished the main planting, and the weeds on most crops are beginning to explode. We are well into our main season, with weekly deliveries, and farm member pickups as well as continued planting, harvest, and planning. How were we going to mesh Kayla into our rocky rhythm?
By the time we got the timber frame brace built for the camper we bought from a neighbor, and by the time we had managed to safely load the camper on our truck, and lumber it on down the road (a few days late, on Wednesday), I confess we had fallen into our rhythm. Kayla is freeing up time by seeding, washing and packing, and harvesting. That left more time for me to work on our campaign, greet members, and actually farm. It’s an amazing what one more full time person can do. We’ve been scabbing it together this season — as many of you know. We've had some part time trained help, but with someone coming only one or two days a week, you fall out of the rhythm of farming, you forgot stuff.
And this week, with the arrival of Kayla, and even though she’s family, Mary’s niece, I feel like we can hold up the sky. This legally paid, on the books employee, is gonna help all of us.
According to a 75-year, Harvard study, one of the biggest secrets to happiness, and I think farm and life happiness, is finding good relationships: “Good relationships keep us happier and healthier. Period.....The biggest predictor of your happiness and fulfillment overall in life is, basically, love."
What’s more interesting is that it’s not the number of friends you have, the data found. It’s the quality and depth of the relationships.
““It’s the quality of the relationships—how much vulnerability and depth exists within them; how safe you feel sharing with one another; the extent to which you can relax and be seen for who you truly are, and truly see another.””
Not only does Kayla help us make time for ourselves, but the time we had to visit with you this past week, changed us. The questions you are asking us, about the farm, ourselves, our strength, our future, they are good ones. From the questions and conversations and all the support you gave us this week, I'll confess you made us cry a lot. But, I think, that’s what we need. Thanks for letting us feel, and helping us feel that we can embrace one another, our farm, and on the best days, hold up part of the sky, even if it’s just to apply some screws and caulk to a problem we need to fix.
See you at market. Kayla may be around in the morning, will likely meet some of you, but she's got the day off to get to know her new summer home.