This Ain't No Green Acres

    
        There are times in a farmer's life where you just want to throw your hands to the sky and just plum give up. The farmer shakes his head, and asks the age-old question, why, God, why? But then the farmer takes a deep breath, gets back into to driver seat of his John Deere 7405, and plows his troubles back into the dirt.
       About four years ago I recall such a time. Our packing shed caught afire about three weeks before the watermelon harvest, and was destroyed. We had over 200 acres of beautiful growing melons in the fields just about ready to be picked. Without a packing shed, there would be no harvest. No harvest, no income. No income, no farm. I'm still not sure how we did it, but the melted tangle of what was left of the packing shed was repaired. Bent and twisted steel beams were replaced, the ashes swept away. The day of picking came, and the packing shed was ready to receive her harvest and we enjoyed one of the best watermelon seasons we've ever had.
        Last night the temperature dipped down, below freezing, to a brisk 27 degrees. When I took my little brother to school this morning I drove by my Uncle's squash field and I had to hold back tears. The plants looked so poor I don't even think a starving deer would eat them. We're about what would be the halfway point of harvesting, so what we've already picked and sold we may have broke even on what we put into the crop. But we were certainly hoping that the profit from the squash crops would pay back debt from the terrible watermelon season we had this year. The market just didn't want our melons, which were perfect, and sadly we fed to the cows, and the horses. We lost quite a bit this year in watermelons.
        Right now my father, grandfather, and our cowboys are gathering calves to sell at the market today so we can make payroll for the squash on Friday. And that's been the story for the past few weeks. Sell cows on Monday and Wednesday at the market, rush to the stockyard on Thursday to get the check, and cross your fingers that Friday's payroll isn't more than what we sold in calves.
       A farmer's dirty laundry is quite dirty. Stained with the dirt of hardship and the manure of bad weather. All I will tell you, anonymous reader, is that we are family farm and ranch in Florida. I will refer to said farm as Sugar Belle Farms but that is only a fictitious name. And my name? Oh you can call me Miss Belle, which isn't my name either but my real first name does start with the letter B.
        What do I hope to accomplish with this internet post? Maybe some of ya'll will smile the next time you're at the produce section of your favorite mega-super-huge-mart or local produce stand and know all the hard work that goes into growing that sweet potato you're fixin' to have with your dinner. Maybe some of ya'll are farmers too and can nod your head in understanding when I say I want to curse the weatherman, or the people in charge of that dadgun food safety bill.
       
--- Miss Belle