#sandbox eric

Farming is a human relationship with nature bounded together by roots. Sometimes the relationship is like a newly infatuated couple, puppy love, when the plants are growing 2 inches a day (perhaps why I love hops) and just the right amount of rain comes at just the right time. Other times, Nature plays the one roommate who doesn't do their dishes: late frost, early frost, hail. Through the thick and the thin, roots are the common bond that hold nature and humans together.

For plants, roots are a deep source of power. Roots provide direction, stability, and communication. Generally, the healthier the roots the better the plant. Their importance to the plant is obvious, there is no chicken and egg between roots and shoots. Roots come first. One shoot may die but the roots will grow another in its place. As we all very well know, if you want to rid yourself of weeds, you have to go to the root of the problem.

Human roots are less tactile, but are they any less important? How healthy can a human be without contact to their roots? Imagine what roots you have in your life. Many take the form of traditions; recipes, music, structures, or stories. Family, arts, and culture play an important role in human roots.

A common cultural phrase describes my roots: “You can take the person out of the farm but you can’t take the farm out of the person.” Like many young farmers these days my parents left the farm and raised me in the suburbs. I didn’t garden, I didn’t cook, I didn’t like to get my hands dirty. My favorite meal was Pizza Hut’s monster 16” 4-cheese pizza with breadsticks and dipping sauce.

But you can’t take the farm out of the person; and my entire life, four generations of roots, were calling me home.

So here I am heading into my third season of farming. Great-grandpa is gone. Grandpa is 90. Dad is still in the burbs. Yet their roots are here with me everyday. Dad’s belt is around my waist. Grandpa’s name is on my ring. Great-grandpa’s photo is on my desk. Their hands are mine in the soil.

For now though I am just another young person struggling with my roots. I wonder: Is my heart healthy enough for all these rooting activities? Should I consult my doctor if I experience rooting for longer than 4 hours? Does this path lead me away from my peers to an isolated place in the country where I complain about "kids these days"? How do I maintain my urban relationships? And more importantly: Why am I so uncertain? Shouldn’t farming be like the spiritual, physical, emotional end all be all of my entire life?

A farmer’s canvas is the farmer’s land.  Just as a Piccasso is different from a Murakami, farmer Peder’s farm is different from farmer Al’s.

What does my farm tapestry look like?

Walking North up the gravel drive the Norwegian flag and seal of the Norwegian King flap away. My family is as Norwegian as any Lutheran Minnesotan family, which is to say we are probably a little Swedish too.

Turning East is the vegetable garden. Enclosed against deer, rabbits, and outside cares. In the same spot as it has been for four generations, gardening here is a visceral experience with history. This garden fed my great grandfather and now it feeds me. We show an equal respect to the land.

Just outside the bounds of the Southerly fence barrier of the garden, past the (moderately sized) Rhubarb patch is the ‘Old Orchard’. Or at least that is what I call it. To Grandma and Grandpa it is just ‘the Orchard’. The old Orchard was planted by my grandparents when my father was a child, some trees have ceased producing, most have grown unruly, all of them make for great climbing. In the spring they give us gorgeous, soft pink and white blossoms that swirl in the breeze delivering aromatic ecstasy to the busy bodys of the planting season and sweet pollen treats to our buzzing friends. In the fall they provide more apple pies, apple buckles, apple crisps, apple crumbles, and apple tarts than one farm can consume.

One more trip south is the ‘New Orchard’ (Norwegian bachelor farmers aren’t known for their creativity in naming/No one ever paid a Norwegian bachelor farmer for naming rights). I planted these trees in the Spring of 2013; apples, pears, and plums. They are my commitment as steward to the land. I will be here for the trees through their sixty year plus life. I will be here for the land.

Turn east and you’ll run into a wall of hops. The most recent addition to the bucolic farmscape is the most rambunctious. These sustainable Cascade hops climb assertively up twenty foot twines and push out sweet cones of Lupulin goodness each fall. Their scent fills the air with a distinctly sensual charge, tempting bearded brewers to begin their brewing arts. Reminding me of the fierce power of the feminine.

Forgetting the diversity of the South the North field is corn. Row on row, standing stilted in the soil. The plant itself is beautiful, green shoots turn to white silk and gold ears. Its major failing is its great utility. Its usefulness has beget a whole system of fuel, feed, and food (additives). Fortunes of Nations have been made from, and laid at the feet of, king corn’s stalks. No longer will my land pay tribute.  

In the Spring of 2014 the North field will be the first to host Sandbox Cooperative farmers. Young farmers growing vegetables, peppers, rabbits, and mushrooms experiencing their first season running their own sustainable farm. From seed to financials and marketing to harvest. Groups of other future food system leaders will join them in discovery. Chefs, entrepreneurs, advocates, artists and intergenerational mentors will gather with these farmers to co-create space for shared professional and personal growth.

        A farm is a reflection of its farmer’s values. What does my farm say about me? Tradition. Heritage. Family. Future. Commitment. Diverse. Passion. Empowerment. Sharing. Alive.

Like all land in America, this land was wrongfully taken from its rightful owners sometime between today and the 1700s. It was formally homesteaded in the early 1800s, sold a few times, and purchased by my great grandfather, Hans Moe in 1933. Originally over 200 acres, now roughly 70 are in the family: 100 were given to my uncles and aunts who built on the land while the rest became Highway 65 or were sold. 

The stones that made up the original farmstead can still be found in the West stand of trees and the second home, built in the late 1800s, still stands but is dilapidated.

Through the 19th century the land was a lively place. Entertaining chickens and pigs, supporting cattle, and giving way to horse-drawn plows. It was the nursery to oat, wheat, and alfalfa seeds as well as the final resting place of their stalks. Gardens and orchards marched about in ever varying patterns.

The second half of the 20th century saw the rise of king corn. All the fields came under his subsidized thumb. The land matched the patchwork quilt, just another swath of yellow corn. At once so impregnable, corn’s reign has come to an end.

Now the land is growing lively once again. Hops, flax, dye plants, and new fruit trees are claiming space. The land can do more. It can support new fields of vegetables and small grains, new herds of animals and habitat for our buzzing and chirping friends.

It can also support new ideas. Ideas of start-up businesses, artists, and advocates. Ideas of K-12 immersive education, gardening workshops, and co-working spaces. It can support the creation of a new food system paradigm and the people who will make it happen.

In 2033 this land will become a Centennial Farm. Who knows what history will be made between now and then?

How many analogies about roads has humanity pondered? CS Lewis, Robert Frost, John F. Kennedy, GK Chesterton, Einstein, JRR Tolkien, Buddha have all had their turn. Our greatest ideals, travails, and deepest questions have found explanation by way of roads. Roads are not all equal. Many roads are mutually exclusive. Our life is defined by which ones we choose to follow, how we decide which ones to follow, when, where, and if we turn back or double on ahead.

For myself, I see two distinct paths forward. At this intersection I have decided to stop and decide. Forward to present comfort, income, and routine? Or forward to uncertainty and change?

Humans are creatures of habit. We like the comfort of the well trod road of cheap food, a 9-5 desk job, and a regular paycheck. We like company, we want to feel like we are a part of a community. After all, who doesn’t watch Monday Night Football with a Miller High Life Lite and McDonalds Mighty Wings(tm)? This is the comfortable road. I’m audacious enough to think I could find a job in it and earn a living, start a family, watch football, and “live happily ever after.” But is it the right decision for me?

Humans don’t like a bumpy road. Just ask City public works departments. Bumpy roads are lonely, job-less, dirty, and if they have signs they aren’t to be trusted. Or so I hear from smooth-roaders. I see potential on this bumpy road. The possibility of something even greater than the smooth road. Societies that make economies work for them. A food system that is a wholly owned subsidiary of the people. A general tide of good overwhelming the forces of darkness. Pain, hard work, and uncertainty are certain on this road, but imagine the possibilities.

So which road will it be?

Stopping to think is the first step.

Why Sandbox Cooperative?

The Friday Roundtable on the Daily Circuit is a regular program on my Friday mornings. A fortnight (maybe it was a furlong) ago, there was a roundtable of consultants each talking about how they got their start. Many of these consultants started with a desire to serve small businesses. They soon gave up those dreams to the practicality of earning a living, consequently for them, this required working for large companies. This was the same conundrum I faced as I tuned in on that Friday morning.

The young farmers and food entrepreneurs I serve cannot afford to pay a consultant; yet many of them crave support, guidance, and entrepreneurial know-how. I know this from personal experience with my previous start-ups: Sunny Brothers Farm and Mighty Axe Hops. The community has abundant resources, passion, education, and drive but traditional consulting services are too expensive for many Millennial start ups. How can we meet the needs of these future food leaders? That is when it hit me: Community Consulting. The answer to delivering consulting services to poor communities is to recognize the resources the communities themselves have. Consulting is not a one-way street. It is not going to be easy to figure this new Community Consulting model out, there will be bumps in the road. This is what Sandbox Cooperative is all about: cooperatively delivering relevant farming, business, and personal support to young food entrepreneurs to build their individual businesses to affect full systems change. More simply put: we help them kick butt. We are so grateful you are joining us at the start of this pioneering journey.