Farm Notes, Week 16

September 18 & 19, Week 16

Well, as many of you know we closed on our house, last Tuesday, in North Greenbush. What a relief to be finally done with that. Friday morning we will buy our new home in New Baltimore. The circle is almost complete. The circle you ask? Yes the circle.

As many of you know I grew up in New Baltimore. I also worked on a farm in town. I worked all through my school days for Alex Kriel. After finishing high school, I went on to community college continuing to work for Alex and another full time job. When Alex passed away in 1998
(I can’t believe its been 10 years) I was the farm manager for the Kriel Farm for 3 years while I finished my bachelor’s degree from SUNY Albany. (Looking back I don’t know how I did all the work on the farm and took a full load of courses each semester.) All those years, what I heard from the farmers in town - Alex included - was that there is no money in farming. Every time someone told me that, I would ask what they meant. Some would say there is no future, others would say you can’t find help and without help you can’t make any money. Others would tell me commodities were priced to help the big mega farms out in the mid-west (basically farm subsidies) and we can’t compete with them. Then I would ask why they were still farming. Some would say they didn’t know how to do anything else, others would say they like being outdoors and as long as the farm could pay the taxes they would continue to make hay. I even had a couple tell me if they stopped they figured they would die because they wouldn’t know what to do with themselves!

At no time did any of them tell me that there was a living in farming. This is exactly what they were doing…making a living. I went to college to get a better job and hopefully have a better living standard then my parents did. For a while that was okay. But the farm kept calling me back. Every free chance I had I was working for the Kriel farm. I kept listening to the little voice in my head, way in the back under all the everyday stuff. That little voice was a farmer I met along time ago; while we were talking, after about an hour of so, he told me I was born a farmer. He said he could tell that I had the passion, drive and heart to be farmer. He also said that folks can be trained to be farmers and some will succeed but most won’t. Keep my head to the grindstone and one day I would have the life that I wanted. Well – he was right. I have the life that I want. I have a great wife who supports me, a beautiful son who I love more everyday, another child due in January and the career that I want. Moving back to my hometown was not easy but it was worth the long, windy ride home. The circle.