Farmers Market People
When we can get the chance to get off the farm, we run with it. After almost two months living outside of Seattle, we had yet to enter into the city. Dusty, tried and daunted by the two hour round trip drive in traffic, we usually look at each other with relief as we agree that, okay, we will go to Seattle… next week.
Yesterday, we made it happen. As we exited the highway, we were stunned by massive scale of the buildings, the tented kingdoms of homeless people, the fancy business people, the quaint outdoor cafes packed with people in sunglasses. I think I was more captivated than Nate, rolling down my window, surfing my hand through the air, crying “I love the city!”
But after navigating a labyrinthine underground parking lot and walking circles insides a swarm of construction zones, long lines, and blasting air conditioning, we drove home a few hours wondering if we are truly becoming country folk. “I never want to leave the farm again,” I panted.
Plus, we were under a trance. We’d watched a totally gorgeous and inspiring story about a couple who transformed a dead 200 acre California farm into a lush biodynamic, give-you-goosebumps-with-its-beauty paradise. (Go see “Biggest Little Farm”!)
Maybe we are country people for now, but we are finding our way to connect with civilization here as we sell at the farmers market twice a week, on Thursdays at the charming Snohomish mountain town market, and on Sundays at the Everett market which overlooks the marina.
With plenty of time to people watch at the Everett market this weekend, Nate and I sat together on a cooler for hours greeting marketgoers from behind our table piled high with bacon, pork chops and speckled brown eggs displayed on a bright blue tablecloth.
Among our farmers market friends…
There was the dad with the “road trip please” t-shirt.
There was the tiny girl with the pink hair who told me “I like your hair” and I said “I like YOUR hair!”
There was the woman with the huge scrawling tattoo on her forearm: family.
There was the guy with the black eye limping around on crutches with casts on his leg and his arm - not drawing any attention to himself at all.
There was the lady trying to sell rice crispy treats before they melted in the sun.
There was the vendor next to us wooing customers: “Only four ingredients. Try a sample!”
There was the Weed Cream Guy booth waving his giant sign: “Re-Leaf”
There was the lady who asked a million questions about our bacon, wanted to see it, touch it, hold it, squeeze - and then said, “thank you” and walked away.
There I was, gaga over the dogs, asking Nate if we could get a puppy over and over again.
I love the farmers market for its weirdos and hippies and moms and health food freaks but I mostly love it because most everyone there seems to be…a little more at ease? A little less obsessed with their phones? I want to believe the market brings out the vacation mode in all of us, and working our booth each week is a front row seat to an amusing carousel of people who are there for the carrots and the turnips, but also for the chance move a little bit more slowly.
The more time I spend learning the trade of farming, I’m coming to what a noble and worthy thing it is to grow food for people. Before we moved here many people mentioned how Seattle was much more progressive in terms of food access and organic farming practices, but Nate and I - more acutely homesick this week - are even more filled with love for the St. Louis farming scene as we feel the lack of OUR people at each market we attend. We are making friends slowly, but often wake up with sore hearts on Saturday mornings wishing we were at the Tower Grove Farmers Market buying greens and eggs from the farmers we love most.
