Boots are better on a Farm

Chapter 9

Boots left behind

Madison and I learn that a modern farm takes old principles and adapts to the methods of the times. Carol teaches us how her operation is now a real corporation, but still a family farm.

When I was just a child in momma's arms

My daddy plowed the ground

and promised someday we would leave

A change of luck was just four days away

But the only change that I remember seeing in my daddy

Was when his dark hair turned to silver grey -

Frazier / Montgomery California Cottonfields

Apple Playlist -- Null Stillness – Gram Parsons Live

Boots are better on a farm

Madison came down she had on shorts and a flannel shirt over a tight-fitting top. It was her pink shoes Aunt Carol objected to. “Those cute canvas jobs will never survive the day” - she began rummaging through a closet. “My friend Shelly left a pair of hiking boots; she is cute and petite like you are. She is not all tall and gangly like we Parker’s are.”

She gave Madison a pair of clunky but practical boots. Madison agreed they were her size as Aunt Carol went off to get her real socks. Madison began explaining without me saying a word, “Hey they weren’t heels or something, I thought they were practical.”

“They will get dirty and ruined. You look really cute in the petite boots.”

“Yes, I am not all tall and gangly like a Parker.” The boots now with the thick white socks fit well. Madison rolled down the tall tops after she had her boots on. Madison’s make-up and hair were always perfect. She got up an hour before I did just to go to class all natural and casual, as she would tell me. I decided she looked ready for auditions of a Dukes of Hazzard remake.

“We should get going, do you have a coat Karen?”

“I have a hoodie in the car?”

“Time to get truckin as some people said back in my day.”

Carol Parker’s truck was not rundown; it was a fairly new full-sized extended cab. I grabbed the camera and sketch pad; I opened the door for the small back seats. “Madison you get the back since you are not all tall and gangly like a Parker” – as I handed her the camera and sketch pad.

I got in and took out my spiral notebook and a pen. “When did you come back and start the farm?”

“Paper and ink not some fancy iPad or something?”

“I learn better when I write as I listen. A computer or iPad would be too much to wrangle in a pickup. What year did you come back here and start Parker Produce?”

“Let me think Grandpa Parker died in 1974, I guess I moved here in 1975. I knew it would be work, I wasn’t some back to the land hippie with visions of a garden of Eden utopia. I had spent three summers helping Grandma weed and pick in the garden. I had learned to can and freeze fruits and vegetables. I studied the health regulations, local markets, and worked out a profit and loss projection.”

“Why did Grandpa Tom decide to keep the farm. Was it because you wanted to come start a business here?”

“He was trying to manage buying the whole farm from his brothers. It was more a good asset for him a way to pay an obligation to his father and mother. I impressed Dad with my attention to detail and a practical plan.”

“Was he you partner when you started?”

“Dad was my landlord, not my partner. He said I would be operating a separate business from the farm, itself. We established a legal entity and a name; he and my brother were both lawyers, as you know. I had good legal advice in surplus.”

“You incorporated your business?”

“No, I had a separate business name. I was a sole proprietorship. I had thought of several names Sweet Baby Jams, White Rabbit Produce, or Moonshadow Farms, but Dad told me not to use any of those damn hippie names. He had searched trademarks and Parker Produce and Fruit was a good name. It would make me sound like a real business, not a free love commune. I had learned to let more things pass, not get in a fight about his less enlightened comments and asides. We began a business arrangement I was the tenant and he was the landlord. He said as long as I was a sole proprietor, I could just be a DBA as Parker Produce and Fruit. Of course, eventually it became just Parker Produce to the locals around here.”

“What’s a DBA?”

“Doing Business As, I don’t think Dad ever expected I could make a real business requiring terms of incorporation or anything like that. Now that I look back, it was unlikely. I don’t think I would have predicted I would have survived and grown. I worked hard, I was smart, and I was lucky, the three best traits for any farmer to have.”

“Grandpa Parker is my great Grandfather? Did he sell fruits and produce?”

“Yes, Eldon Parker was my grandfather and he operated the farm until he died. We had a lot of fruit trees mostly apples, but it was never a commercial orchard. Most of the trees were here just west of the lane, a few over on the south 20 I’ll stop over there. The south twenty was part of the original 160-acre Parker homestead. When they were dividing an estate another branch of the family became owners. I think my great grandfather bought the 20 back. It was really where the Parker Produce and Fruit Farm started. Your great grandfather operated a real farm as the locals would say, not a truck garden.”

Madison came bouncing out after we stopped and began taking photos of the lane to the house, the country road. I am not sure what she was capturing. She was busy. After a while she came back and grabbed her sketch pad. Aunt Carol had gone on with the history of farm showing me the raised beds and explaining the different varieties of fruit trees. Madison had a question, “your grandfather was really named Eldon?”

“Yes, he was.” Madison found a cart to sit on and began sketching the old barn. We walked to the end of the drive where we had entered the south 20. “The farm from the house to the north east is a 160-acres, it is level and a good soil for row crop. Starting down there at that big post to the northwest is the Hayes 160. The creek runs through it and the fields are smaller and not square. The pasture is over there and that is why he had a cowherd. Grandma Parker was a Hayes and Grandpa started farming the west 160 after they were married and eventually bought it from her siblings. This 340-acres was Grandpa Eldon’s farm for many years. He rented another 80 what we call the East Place and he bought it in the 50’s. It was a decent size farm back in that time. When I came here Dad had worked out a cash rent on everything except the ten acres around the house and this twenty. He used the revenue to pay for the two thirds of the farm he had bought from his brothers. Dad said each generation of farmer just got it all paid for and then he passed it on and the loans and scraping by started all over again. “

“The house and this field around the old barn became the start of Parker Produce and Fruit.”

“I think Sweet Baby Jams was a cute name. I like White Rabbit produce, not sure about Moonshadow. I went to a James Taylor Bonnie Raitt concert. I had a friend whose mother wanted to go. See I know something about Boomer culture.”

“Sweet Baby James was a very popular album. I don’t think my father found James Taylor a selling point. On Parker farm I had two barns, lots for holding a few head, a machine shed, and an old crib. Some established fruit trees and several garden plots. It was enough to get started. I had a plan. I worked the numbers. My landlord was pretty much in favor of me doing anything. He felt like I couldn’t get into too much more trouble back here. I think he hoped I might get married lead a normal life. He certainly hoped I was done vagabonding across the country from concert to concert with a worthless hippie boyfriend.””

“You were like a Deadhead?”

“We didn’t just go to Grateful Dead concerts. Deciding we should go to a concert and heading there was the only time our life had any direction.”

“Was your boyfriend a worthless hippie?”

“Yes, he was worthless. We all thought we were hippies, however we defined that. Let’s get on with the tour, your friend has been busy.”

“She’s the illustration and media part of this project, I’m the writer.” We walked back to where Madison had been working. Madison showed us a very nice sketch of the barn.







  photo by Sujo7 on Flickr