How's it growing?

I’ve been to the Mill City Farmers Market over the last two weekends. I’m very happy with the blue sheep’s cheese from Shepherd’s Way Farms and the great-for-ice-cream milk from Cedar Summit Farms. I was going to give it one more weekend and blog about my planned yak’s meat purchase, but now there’s Gertrude.

I bought an heirloom tomato plant, and because I can’t remember what kind it was I’ve dubbed her Gertrude. I know I’m late to the planting game. I can’t seem to get my act together this year, even for the ultimate reward of fresh tomatoes. But there she sits in a giant terra cotta pot on my patio, sunning herself far away from the greedy, evil bambies and bunnies. And now I worry.

Is she getting enough sun or too much? How many times a day should I be watering and if it rains what does that do to the watering schedule? Maybe it’s because I have this one and only plant that I’m obsessing. Maybe it’s because I feel that as a food person, I should be able to bring forth food from the earth with aplomb and grace.

In an effort to find out Gertrude’s lineage, I began scouring the websites of the vendors for the market. Maybe I’d recognize a name, a farm logo, something to jog my caffeine addled brain.

That’s how I found Gardens of Eagan and their farmer blogs. I’m riveted by Atina Diffley’s passionate race to save organic fields from the pipeline. But I’m nearly addicted to Laura Ferich’s telling of the second year on her Loon Organics farm. Her love of eating what she’s growing, the guarded excitement over the purchase of farm equipment, concern for bugs and all that needs to be done in a scant 18 hour day has me hooked.

Most people don’t know about the toil that goes into farming, even now that small farms and organics are becoming chic. It’s like the chef thing: the splashy media doesn’t really want to talk about time spent cleaning squid.

The more I read about all they do to make a life out of organic farming, the more I feel that Gertrude’s going to be just fine….