Real Farmers

I was watching Good Morning American.
They have where they are traveling by
train across the USA.

Today they were in corn country. There
was acres and acres of corn. As they
showed it, it reminded me how we
get feelings that all is good with the
world. At least all of us who have
ever farmed in anyway or size.

With pictures of Wall Street and banks
closing or in trouble, of floods and hurricanes
it is nice to see that middle American is still
doing well. But one wonders for how long.

A lot of people don’t understand farming.
Even as a kid we had differences. I am from
a large island called Aquickneck. It has Newport,
Middletown and Portsmouth. And near by is
several little islands, and one other large one,
Jamestown. We all started in our own little town
schools, but all went to the same public high school.
There were the city kids, from Newport, the clammers,
from Jamestown and Middletown and Portsmouth were
the farmers, as the kids would call each other. My parents
had a small horse farm.

In high school, even with Future Farmers of America,
(they had cool jackets) farmers were looked down on. You
became a farmer, was the general thought, because you weren’t
smart enough to do another job. Which is a very sad state of affairs.
Because rarely is there anyone who works as hard as a farmer.

They are thought of making up their own hours. Get up
whenever, go out and dig dirt and chase cows. Ride tractors.
You know fun stuff…
When the truth of the matter is, the animals are what
rules the hours, which can be 4am. And calving time,
and a brood mare can have you in the barn all night long.

I am talking real farmers. Not the business that buy
up farms and run them like a corporation. Not the
big ones who are paid not to grow a product. I am
talking about the farmer who is struggling each
day. The family farmer. Some who even have to
have a second job, to keep it going.

Another thing that I noticed here local is the 4-H.
While going to the 3 local fairs of our area, I noticed
that the animal parts were lacking. Where there had
been barnful of cattle, pigs, and etc. That this year,
Each barn, at each fair was only a 1/3 full. What
has happen? Lack of interest? Fewer farms?
Fewer farms due to more selling out to housingprojects?