Solstice Musings: Veggie Share #3 – June 22

Happy Solstice!

Today marks a special day – the most day light we will experience all year long. It sneaks up on me every time, and I find it so wild to think about how the days only get shorter from here on out.

I wonder if any of you celebrate this day?

The spiritual side of me, the agnostic part of me, feels that this is a very important day to have reverence for the sun and all it brings us. While I’m loading trucks, driving tractors, watering plants, banding bunches of greens in the field – I imagine fun ways to celebrate this day. I ask employees what they would do to celebrate if they did. Lots of talk, lots of imagining.

The reality, however, is that I just mostly think about the solstice because on a practical level, a farmer just doesn’t have time to do much else on the solstice.

On this day, it is the height of insanity of a farm. All the plants, whether weeds or cultivars, are photosynthesizing as much as they can. I can almost feel the pulse of living things growing, growing, growing all around me. As farmers we have all the figurative balls in the air this time of year. We are still seeding, still transplanting, we are weeding, we are harvesting… we are doing it all. And all of us are pulsing, sweating, working. And yet it seems like we never have enough hands – the demands feel endless.

The days are long. The sun shines. The weeds grow. And we hustle and hustle to keep up with it all.

I LOVE it. I feel one with the plants – going, going, going in the sun.

If I were to celebrate, I would write on an index card all the big and small joys I feel around this time, and then burn it in honor of the sun. But instead, I’ll send my gratitude out to you via a screen and hope the sun still feels my reverence.

Warm, juicy strawberries on my tongue.
Pants that smell of garlic scapes even after many washings.
Panting dog.
Bright, lush green all around me – a quilt of green shades.
The first pea on my tastebuds.
A two-way radio that goes off all day as I coordinate folks around the fields.
The post-work cold shower.
The first broccoli and zucchini.
Sweaty skin – the marvel of our own bodily AC units.
Food, food and more food.
Thank you sunshine!

Sincerely,
Farmer Cassie