Wild weather changes. Steady rain and thick fog this morning, but a new weather system pushed in around noon time. The rain stopped, the sun burned off the fog and within 10 minutes it was a full on sunny day. Temperature started in the low 50Fs but rose to upper 60Fs with the sun.
Today was the last big picking day-- there's nothing left now. I rolled into the farm a few minutes late this morning and gave Gizzie a hand straightening up the store. We loaded up the trash and started cleaning around the produce wagons when Newport and the foreman finally drove up-- real late. The foreman had another car accident-- he was fine, but the repairs are going to be a fortune and an endless problem.
First up was the cabbage. We headed to the hilltop and filled 6 boxes with everything left. Dumped off the cabbage heads at the store and took off to the lower fields-- next was the final round of kale. This time, instead of picking off good leaves, we chopped the good 'tops' off each plant and bunched them as they were. Filled 4 crates of dinosaur and 3 crates of red bore. The foreman's arugula in the center of the lower fields looked ready-- so we inched along and over 2/3 of the triple row: we filled 8 crates.
Time for lunch and drying out.
After lunch we headed back to the lower fields and filled 5 sopping wet sacks with corn. Not much of anything is left anywhere. CSA was starting soon, so we washed up all the greens and filled up the wagon displays. Saturday is the last CSA pick up of the year, only the store and a few market's are left after that. Today we had: 5 types of potatoes (Red Norlands, Yukon Golds, Satinas, Keuka Golds and Kennebunks), red bore/dinosaur kale, butternut/buttercup squash, big tomatoes, corn, broccoli, arugula, green peppers, beets and cabbage-- lots of everything, but the variety has slimmed down. The boss was scratching his head trying to think of more for us to do: One last big haul-- the foreman, Newport and I tractored up to the forest field and cleared the last row of beets. We took everything, but sorted them 2 ways-- the few big beets were bound and bunched, the many tiny beets were clipped down and boxed. Managed to get 1 crate of bunches and 4 big boxes of loose beets.
That was it. We returned to the farm, washed the beets and just stood around. Newport took off early to go to a hockey game with his girlfriend, the foreman flipped through a seed catalog in the store and Gizzie was tied up making jam in the kitchen. I hopped in and lent Gizzie a hand pouring in the pectin, so the jam would set properly, but after that there was nothing left in the fields.
Well almost nothing. I clamored up into the tractor and drove into the remains of the brother's big pumpkin garden-- time for the last of the giants to make their way up to the storefront. I heaved 4 front loaders worth up the hill and arranged them as best as I could manage. Looking for busy work, I took the tractor down to the greenhouse and sorted all the rotten squash out of the piles-- filled an entire front loader with the rot. I dumped it all in the compost heap, returned the tractor and waited the rest of the day away.
I sat down with the boss before the day's end-- tomorrow begins the field clean up work. The days of picking are truly over (although, I swear there has to be more potatoes up on the hill). It's scary stuff.
The foreman came over at closing time and asked if I could give him a lift to the auto-body shop, where his car was being repaired. I said, of course. We chatted on the way-- this weekend is the big one for him. It's a quiet secret that the foreman is hoping to move on this winter. He's been talking to several farms around the city who are looking for a field manager. He wants both worlds-- living with his girlfriend in the city and working for a good farm wage. This weekend he's going to meet one of the farmers.
And maybe it is about time for him to move on-- he's been working this farm with the boss for the past 8 years. But all of this really has me thinking. I'm not blind to all that's been happening this summer-- I've been groomed to take the foreman's place. The boss has been teaching me field layouts, planting/watering times and cycles, he's got me in the tractor and out taking apart pumps/machinery. I just don't know. Talking with Darlin, I keep trying to make up my mind-- cause I'm moving to the city over the winter too. The question is: whether I'm staying there in Spring or coming back to be foreman. And I have got no answer yet.
I love this job, and that's no secret. I'm pretty good at it and there's much more to learn. The boss is an unusually good man and I owe him my sanity-- this job caught me right before I teetered off the edge from unemployment into crazy. But then there's Darlin, friends, writing and many things waiting down in the city. Hm. I would miss the brush burning and planting in Spring, long Summer and Fall harvests.
But I keep coming back to that line from Thoreau-- "It was time that I left Walden, for there were other lives to lead."
Darlin is coming tomorrow. We're meeting up with Gizzie and heading to a good ol' friend's 30 birthday. It's suppose to be quite the affair. I'm also drinking with Gizzie tonight-- I'm suppose to read through and critique the scripts he's been working over. Hm. Thinking to be done.
Take it easy.
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