weeding, and more weeding...

David makes sure Bobby dosen't take too many stretch breaks!

Not much to report.  Seriously spent an entire day weeding yesterday.  Some good news though - my body has been showing signs of adjustment to the ‘bent-at-waist’ position, because, as of today, I can go at least one hour without that burning, sharp, pain shooting through my, well,  pretty much everything.  I could only manage about 10 minutes of pain-free bending at the beginning of the season.  And let me tell you, to look up after 10 minutes and find you’ve only completed 1/16^th of a bed, with several beds to go, is pretty damn torturous.  Hence, my excitement over reaching the one hour mark.  After that hour though, it sometimes takes all I’ve got to keep myself from straight-up screaming.    Most of the time I just try and ignore the pain.  Other times I imagine I am a soldier in the ARMY, or (and this is terrible) a war torn child, where pain just equals life, and to crumble to it would mean my death (a little intense, yes, but it works!).  Sometimes, I convince myself I can go all ‘zen’ on the pain, embracing the wholeness of the experience.  This works almost never. I guess one positive is that everyone is pretty much in the same boat as me, (thank god), so it’s not like I’m the only one hunched over, squinty-eyed, limping off the fields.  It was in a weakened state like this that Ashley unsympathetically forewarned us that if we were sore now, we’d better get a grip, because by July our workload would be at least 2 to 3 times harder than what we do on a typical day right now.  I can only imagine four scenarios in which I survive this:

 #1. I have a summer of back to back manic episodes

#2.  I make it, barely, through 9 hours of a workday, and sleep through the other 16 

#3. I triple in size and bust it out like a pack animal, or,

#4.  (and I hate to say it but) I break a bone or twist up my back and am rendered incapacitated, therefore unburdened of any stress related to the anticipation of increasingly difficult physical labor. 

On another note, the crops in “South Dakota” (the front field) are really beginning to flourish!  We took all of the row covers off today and the colors were stunning!  This week we will finally be able to cut salad to bring to the farmer’s market!  We’ve been unable to go the past three weeks due to cold soil = stunted salad green growth.  Apparently this weather is slightly unusual, as Bill can’t remember a time when Horton missed so many markets in a row.  However, he isn’t concerned because the bulk of the farm’s income is generated during July, August, and September. 

Salad greens and adult lettuces in South Dakota

Today we went on our second field trip to Wintergreen Farm – which is right down the road in Noti.  (Yup, good ole’ “No-Tie”.)  Wintergreen is a 120 acre biodynamic farm run by three families (one individual who was once an apprentice at Horton!).  The moment we arrived we were put to work planting tomatoes in a greenhouse triple the size of ours.  No one explained what we were doing, what the farm was all about, or anything that would have made me feel like we were actual guests.  The farm was so big that we had to transport the starts to the greenhouses by truck, during which we met some employees who filled in some gaps but basically knew little about biodynamic farming (which was the most interesting aspect of this farm, in my opinion).  After two hours of planting, we’d filled three of these gigantic greenhouses.  To put this in comparison, at Horton, so far, we've planted two rows of tomato plants, which is about half a greenhouse (a small 96 ft. one), which took us all of 20 minutes.  Finally, once we were done, one of the owners took us on a walking tour and answered some of our questions.  However, at that point, all I really had interest left for was a hot shower and cold beer.  I’m so glad I was able to experience work on a farm that size – it made me realize how lucky I am to be at Horton, where our team is like a family (not just a bunch of workers), and as we pulled into the driveway, I had the sudden feeling of coming home.

Gettin to work at Wintergreen!