In which farming gets me all hot and bothered

My life right now feels overly hectic, which is a little silly. This summer is not particularly stressful, as it's mainly composed of a part-time internship, biking, and putting up food for the winter, all of which I enjoy thoroughly. I think maybe living a stress-culture life eight months of the year probably has its effect on the other four.
Anyway, the place where I feel the most at home these days is my garden. It's a cute little plot, smack dab in the center of a community garden. I dug the entire thing up this spring* with some help from friends and family. When I got back from Montréal, it was absolutely covered in weeds, but in between the dandelions and unidentified greens that like to choke the life out of the other plants, there were some carrots. And lettuce. And beans. And I beamed like a proud parent of slightly vegetal children.
To bring those two paragraphs together, what I'm trying to say is that this year, my garden is my main space. I'd never really thought I'd be the type to enjoy digging up quack grass and pulling up weeds. After all, I was a bookish child with many, many pollen allergies. But things have changed, and I'm pretty much up in the plot any chance I get. It's calm in there. It's been said, I know, but I feel altogether a bit zen when I'm there. Which is a nice change. And weirdest of all is the recurring thought that if I enjoy it this much, who knows, maybe I'd enjoy doing it on a larger scale. I'm not exactly being groomed for farming over here at this liberal arts college of mine, but it's possible that I could end up being a farmer with some academia on the side. This train of thoughts is probably why I'm clutching thirstily at every word that Zoë Bradbury is writing over at Edible Portland. She's a former urbanite who sold it all and moved to start farming in Southern Oregon. She blogs about the ups and some of the very unexpected downs (who knew that the USDA was so ill-prepared to help small farmers?) right here. It all reminds me about how damn excited I get when I remember that food grows out of the ground. It sounds simple, but trust me, pulling up a carrot and remembering when it was a tiny seed in my hand is nothing short of miraculous.



*lies. I'm still digging up the north section. Bad, I know. Full of procrastination.