Today next to and in between the corn you can glimpse growing through the rye in this photo, we planted pumpkins for our granddaughter. Sam is committed to grandfathering.

He is also committed to the long term project of restoring this land, stripped of nutrients after years of tillage. Tillage pulverizes the earth by mechanical means and destroys its soil biology. It is usually partnered with synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, furthering the degradation.  

Early last fall, after years of reading, learning, understanding and taking smaller steps towards regenerative agriculture, Sam took back two acres of his tenant farmer’s acreage for healing. It will no longer experience tillage. 

Then in October, while these two special acres had corn still standing, Sam walked through and dropped cereal rye in between the stalks so it would start to grow before winter. With the corn as cover crop and the rye as living root in the ground, the soil was covered and protected all winterlong. This prevented the soil from drying out, minimized soil erosion and fed the soil biology with the decomposing mulch (the corn) which is enjoyed by earthworms and other bugs. Also, because water filtration and aeration increases with cover crop and living root, more of the rain water is captured, there is less need to irrigate. So we wintered, doing other things around the place. We know that it takes about three years before a healthier ecosystem is reestablished. Sam and I have patience. We believe and feel the invisible work of restoring the soil is in process.  

About a month ago, in May, the rye was green and thriving. But then it was time to crimp the stalks with the roller crimper which has chevron blades every 4 to 5 inches. It rolls over and lays the rye down, blanketing the soil with a spongy layer of soil coverage that smells sweet and nutty. And into that gold, dry and nurturing mulch, we planted Bloody Butcher Corn. 

Bloody Butcher Corn, with its deep maroon kernels, has about twice the protein of conventional varieties of corn, and is rich in minerals and antioxidants. When we harvest it, we will grind it ourselves to make cornmeal for the most delicious cornbread. It will also be the corn, the deer and birds, and other animals, will prefer later in the season for its richest of nutrients.  But for now the rye is dead and the spring green bloody butcher corn is just pushing through it.  But, green or gold, rye is beautiful. Now lying flat, reflecting shimmery white gold dusky sun, with feathery leggy spikes woven all around into flat baskets prostrate on the ground, it's ready to bed down. It will protect the pumpkins we planted today, fulfilling our hopes of it becoming a patch for our granddaughter to delight in this fall. 

What would it be like to have Genevieve here with us and her parents, planting pumpkins? 

We start at one end of the two acres and pace across. About every four feet, Sam hammers his shovel in the compacted dirt to make a small mouth, he calls it a ‘hill’, that swallows the two or three pumpkin seeds I place inside it along with a small prayer for life. In this way, we traverse the 30 or 40 yards across the field; he digs, cuts down a few random weeds and I sow, both of us avoiding and protecting the spindly leaves of the young corn starting up through the rye, all the way to the other side. Then we move another row west by about 15 feet and begin sowing back across the field to the north. Even though we have waited until dusk, the sun is still intense and burns with a heat that causes us to sweat, feel tired. My legs are glowing red and I will find out when I shower later that, even through my long sleeve shirt,  my arms and shoulders have been toasted a bit. This planting will extend over two evenings because it’s so hot and tedious. In all we have planted 25 rows of pumpkins. Sam, not a religious man, implores the pumpkins to grow. He repeatedly utters “I hope they grow” as we plant. Alongside his years of hands-on farming practice and his lifetime work in environmental science, he carries spirituality. 

Instead of me holding the different containers of pumpkin seeds–Warty Pumpkin 2021, Corn Pumpkin 2019, Winter Luxury Pumpkin 2022 and Dickinson Squash 2021–she would hold the hand of her very tall father who would hand her two silky dried pumpkin seeds to drop into the hill her grandpa dug for her. Genevieve would deep squat with her 2 year old legs close to the hole, peer inside and watch the seeds tumble from the free hand she has and land in their new cozy moist home. She squeals, sticks her tongue out as she does, showing her perfect baby teeth, looking up at her mama and me who stand nearby. Then, her father swings her up high and back into his arms as he follows grandpa the next four giant steps, avoiding the young Bloody Butcher Corn rising through the resting rye, to the new hill he’s digging for her to drop the next set of seeds into. And the next and the next. 

We won’t spend long planting. It’s hot and there is full sun–the sting of the heat and the dead rye poking and prickling at our ankles compete with the flies at our knees and we turn out of the field. We all walk upon the buoyant mulch which casts a reflective shine back at us from the long mid-summer sun. It’s a field of gold. But even so, with all of us back at the air conditioned house and watching a movie, she will have had her hand in this land now and when she returns in the fall to pick her pumpkins, she will remember them as hers. And when she is older and comes back year after year, tending to her pumpkin patch, the two acres would’ve grown to 10 maybe, and then more. And she has learned ancient and healing ways of relating to her family, community and the land.

We have tried to connect our daughters to the farm but so far they don’t come much, haven’t come much.  I can’t say I blame them, for I find something familiar in their separating and independence. Nothing my parents could show me was what I wanted as a young person.  But now my dad is 89 years old and I am a grandparent and I’ve learned slowly over all these years about the connections between generations, among so many things. 

Sam and I, we can have patience for their return. 

Family, maybe it’s like building the soil, where you layer listening, trusting, offering consistency and loving them over and through the absences when you don’t see them, just as regenerative agriculture seeks to recapture the health of the land by fostering biodiversity, enriching the soil, and minimizing harm in slow time. Sam often talks about passing down not just the farm but also a legacy of resilience and care for the planet, and I want the same; and also for people, care for people. Regenerative practices build resilience in the land against scarcity, empty calories, drought and pests. Fostering strong family and community bonds across generations builds resilience against the catastrophes that are coming our way through the channels of power, separation, greed and ignorance. It's about nurturing interconnectedness and all ways of knowing, repairing what's been damaged, and ensuring that what we leave behind is informed by what we have and continue to learn of indigenous and ancient ways of being and thriving in community.

As we work to strengthen our relationships within the family, we recognize that our efforts are intertwined with the land itself. We aim to create a sustainable ecosystem and we aim also  to create a sustainable legacy of love, understanding, and connection. Through this stewardship of the living things we hold dear, we hope to cultivate a future where our children and grandchildren feel rooted in both the land and in the enduring strength of family ties.

We hope for the future–all in these ways.