Heaving A Sigh of Relief

In the last two weeks of our harvesting season, my fellow farmer and I are always heaving things around: first heaving ourselves out of bed at 4:45 a.m., then heaving around 40 lb bags of carrots or crates of rutabagas and daikon radishes. 

But once the CSA season is over, all the heaving we do is heaving a sigh of relief. Now we are in our easy-going time, our clean-up time, our odds and ends time. 

1. The first easy-going project is an irrigation task. All summer and fall we'd been wishing our irrigation line for the fall carrots was in better shape. Carrots are slow to germinate, and want to be moist for three weeks before they poke their green heads up.

When we ran the irrigation, half of the bed that had nice red sprinklers got watered, and half of the bed that had yukky red sprinklers didn't. Thus I had several five-gallon buckets at the far end of the garden, and every time we irrigated I would take off the end cap of one irrigation line and fill the buckets. Then I would dip out a yogurt container full and water down the track where the carrots had been sown. Did the carrots germinate? Yes. Was this an efficient use of a farmer's time? No.

One morning after harvest was over, my fellow and I spent four hours replacing the yukky red sprinklers with the nice red sprinklers. We untangled lines, found enough good sprinklers, found the special tool to make the holes in the line to plug in the sprinklers, and got the line all fixed before realizing the line was way too long. 

But we were in no hurry; we did it all over again to the right length. We also had to reorganize the piles of irrigation lines, after tossing everything around trying to find the right stuff. Now our piles are tidy and our carrot line is ready for another year.  

2. The second easy-going project is for Thanksgiving. My sisters and I divide up making the Thanksgiving dishes, and my little family of three is responsible for mashed potatoes, winter squash, creamed onions, pumpkin pie, and gluten-free dressing. 

“Wow,” I said, by the third sort-of-easy-going day in the kitchen. “This is a lot of work. I don't know how my mother ever got a whole Thanksgiving meal together by herself.”

My daughter, who was making the pumpkin pie, said, “Did you count the four hours freezing the last of the spinach? Did you count the nine hours baking all the seconds and not quite ripe squash, and then adding maple syrup and cooking them down more so they would taste better?”

“Did you count sorting through all the boxes of onions to get the littlest ones for the creamed onions, and peeling the celeriac that were too tiny to give out to CSA members? It takes a long time to peel this celeriac. And you don't get much when you do,” added my celeriac-peeling fellow.

“Oh, yeah!” I said, relieved that I wasn't completely failing my mother, and that I have two sisters with families that were also busily cooking and baking. Plus I was relieved that Thanksgiving happens in the easy-going, clean-up, odds and ends season.

3. The third easy-going project: we are shoveling dirt from underneath one of our vegetable tables to fill in the holes in front of the tables and in front of the woodshed. Where did all these holes come from?

This is what our daughter said over the summer when she was visiting, kindly helping us on harvest day and marveling as we stumbled into the holes: “Isn't this the definition of comedy? You watch the dog dig holes. You don't fill in the holes. Then you fall in the holes.” 

Oh ha ha ha! Everything seems funnier in easy-going, clean-up odds and ends season. 

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, Dec 10 - Dec 16, 2025

Irrigation Irritation: Creating Ha-Ha-Ha-Harmony in the Farm and the Universe

Irrigation drives this vegetable farmer bonkers. In the past, it has worked very nicely to busy myself with other chores while my fellow farmer tackled the irrigation duties, which do not drive him bonkers, despite our old, leaky, kinked-up driplines and holey headers system.

This year, however, for the first time, we used our beautiful new irrigation system, with brand new drip lines and fancy new headers, which came to us thanks to a wonderful grant from the Natural Resources Conservation Service. I needed to help protect, preserve, and prolong the life of all this nice new irrigation; it was also high time to conquer my irrigation-induced madness.

After all, how could rolls of mere plastic and little metal bits deliver me into such a towering rage, year after year? I was determined to vanquish this deterrent to harmony in myself, the farm, and the universe.

Thus I went boldly out to the field armed with masses of twine and a good sharp knife. Maybe my problem was not having enough stuff to corral the irrigation while I was rolling it up. I would tie it so firmly over and over to itself that it couldn't play any of its nasty irrigation tricks. (Or maybe if all else failed, I could cut it up into tiny pieces with my good sharp knife!)

Alas, though I nearly strangled the irrigation with string and twine, it did not help a bit. The irrigation was still a kinked up, writhing pile of black plastic, and I was still a kinked up, writhing pile of rage. My fellow farmer wisely gave me lots of room, and offered no advice. He simply went along, tidily rolling up three lines in the time it took me to mangle one.

I surreptitiously studied my fellow's technique: what the heck was he doing differently than I was? An idea came creeping into my overheated brain: maybe I was trying to do it all too quickly. I was just trying to get it over with because I hate it. Maybe I needed to slow down.

I took a deep breath. I decided to pretend I was my fellow farmer, who seemed to think rolling up irrigation could be a pleasant affair, especially on a fine autumn day, and hey, so what if there was a very occasional kink in the drip line? That's just the nature of irrrigation.

I tried again. I went very very slowly. I quit caring how much my fellow was ahead of me. I quit trying to get it all done before lunch. I quit worrying that I might put a kink in the new driplines. I just rolled with it, so to speak.

And by golly, at the end of my 200 feet bed, I had rolled my first circle of tidy, hardly-kinked-at-all irrigaton. Plus I had a great start on my best selling self-help book for irrigation roller-uppers:

Tips for Those Taxed with Rolling Up Irrigation

Firstly, minimize distractions. Have a hearty snack before you start the project. Tie your hair back firmly, or cut it all off, so that no wisps can poke your neck or your cheek. Don a hat that doesn't constantly fall in your eyes. Wear your least raggedy clothing, or the end of the dripline will catch on every frayed bit or hole.

Choose your timing carefully. Roll up your driplines on a sunny, cool day, with no bugs. Arrange for pleasant bird-song and pretty clouds in the sky, while you're at it. Don't wait to roll up your irrigation until it is covered in snow, which makes it darned hard to find and darned cold to handle.

Don't compare yourself to anyone else. Especially your fellow farmer, who is working three times faster than you are, and whistling cheerfully, to boot. Why, you are you, and you have your own strengths and challenges!

Give yourself a little respite. Even though that same fellow farmer rolls up driplines both coming and going, up and down the field, you can decide to roll from only one direction, which allows you a 45 second period of peace, as you make your dripline-free way back to your starting point.

Savor whatever you are able: Savor the bird song, or savor the lack of bugs, or the lack of snow, or savor the fact that you are lucky enough to have a working irrigation system, and a pond, and water. Or you could actually savor the fact that your fellow farmer is working three times faster than you are, because it will save you lots of irksome work.

Or, indeed, thanks to your lovely new slowing-down-as-you-are-rolling-up method, you could savor the harmony you are helping to create in yourself, your farm, and the universe.

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, Jan 17- Jan 28, 2018

Irrigation Irritation: Rolling it All Up on the Farm

There are lots of things to celebrate on a New England vegetable farm in November.

First and foremost, there’s already been a killing frost, and the garden plants are all dead.  Hooray!

Secondly, since there’s been that frost, most of the root vegetables-- carrots, beets, daikon radishes, purple top turnips, rutabagas-- have already been dug.  Hooray!

Thirdly, by now, in November, all the bags and boxes and bins have been properly stored in the root cellar, rather than heaped and piled all over the living room and kitchen, leaving only narrow winding paths through the house.  Now we can walk from our front door to the couch to the kitchen stove without stumbling over a thing.  Hooray!

Fourthly, our draft horses, who have had a merry the-pasture’s-getting-short-let’s-break-out-and-visit-the-neighbors’-fields time of it, are now happily in their winter paddock, gobbling down all that good hay we put up last summer.

Fifthly, we are nearing the end of our vegetable distribution season, which runs from early June to the week before Thanksgiving.  We love our CSA members; we love to have them come to the farm; and we also love the rhythm of six months of farm pick-ups and six months of no farm pick-ups.  It gives us a good solid opportunity to miss our nice members.

Sixthly, in November, we can take a bit more cavalier approach to our work: Hmm, shall I roll up the irrigation today . . . or tomorrow?

In this particular farmer’s case, when it comes to irrigation, I would like to say “tomorrow” indefinitely.  Though my fellow farmer seems to have no difficulty dealing with our drip (also called “trickle” irrigation, as we’ve heard some folks say around here) irrigation, I find it maddening, to say the least.

In fact, the first time I had to roll irrigation lines, almost twenty years ago, as an intern on a biodynamic farm near Philadelphia, I couldn’t quite believe how onerous I found the task.  Though I am normally a patient, non-cussing sort of person, I had to bite my tongue.

The other interns were chatting, rolling their irrigation lines into easy symmetrical loops.  My line was thrashing and kicking, kinking and screaming.  I too wanted to thrash and scream, but I was fairly new at the farm, not quite comfortable rolling out a seldom-used line of cuss words as I attempted to roll my drip line.

As the other interns walked away smiling, with their quiet, co-operative loops of line tucked cozily under their arms, the head farmer approached, watching my lack of progress closely.

“How’s it going here?” he asked.         

I breathed deeply, searching for an appropriate, non-expletive answer.  Finally I said, “I’m finding it . . . soul-strengthening.”

The farmer, bless his heart, laughed.  And twenty years later, my fellow farmer, once my former fellow intern, is still laughing, in the nicest way possible.

“How’s it going?” he says, loping down the beds towards me and my tangle of irrigation line.  “Is your soul really strong yet?  Here, pal, let me finish that up for you.”

I’m not sure if his offer is motivated more by sympathy for me, or by sympathy for the mangled irrigation line (which really is a wonderful line, very efficient, water-saving, and all that good stuff), but I don’t care. 

I am only happy to hand it over.  And happy that is wonderful November, when even the irrigation is rolled up and quietly resting for the winter.

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, Nov 27 – Dec 3, 2013