The Invisible Golden Thread: Farmer Natalie McGill
For farmers Natalie McGill and Stewart Lundy of Perennial Roots Farm, there is magic is to be found in each simple task at hand, weaving its way through with an invisible golden thread.
Water clings to the leaves, tiny droplets sparkling against a muted sky. The rain has ceased for now but leaves an odd melancholy that hangs in the air, waiting to pounce. All is quiet, an earthy, wet dog scent overwhelms my senses. I haven't even started harvesting but already I am soaked past my knees. Wading through the garden after a rain or at first light when the dew is high can be quite the ordeal. Boots wet, the damp already threatening to occupy my socks, I step gingerly through the fava beans that now stand almost as tall as I.
Pops of pink and purple and white catch my sight: flowers I’d planted among rows of food, knowing I would crave their flashes of color amidst the sea of green. The air is thick, my limbs heavy and a veil of humidity pervades. The melancholy attempts to grasp at me again. It follows me, an unwelcome but familiar specter lurking quietly in the shadows, daring me to come take a dip. Some mornings the hurt is too much, though I can't explain or make sense of it.
Then I come to the garden. I shake hands with the enormous leaves shielding the broccoli, I bend nose to flower and take in the oily scent of calendula and chamomile. The root vegetables prefer a slightly rougher greeting as my boots graze their leafy canopies, while I take care not to ignore the oft-forgotten stalwarts like lettuce and arugula. To all, I declare my fealty and compliment their beauty and bounty. To a few, like the spinach, choi, and tomatoes, I gush profusely, showering them with accolades. Never have I been so smitten with such symmetry and curves and color! Some gentler souls like the eggplant and peppers prefer a soft pet, just a whisper of fingertips atop their leaves. The peas merrily climb their trellis, festooned with flowers--purple and green pods fit for a birthday party or solstice feast. I bend down and peek under the nasturtiums for the hundredth time: maybe this time I will spot a fairy. Ah, but I remind myself, we have fairies already as I watch our old friends, the barn swallows, dip and dive, greeting me and the garden in their comforting, familiar way.
The garden grounds me and keeps me sane. But the garden also fuels the daydream believer in me. Which is it? Can it be both? My worries, woes, distractions, and questions find succor here. Fearful for the state of the world? Let's just weed it out along with the marestail and ragweed. Worried about the future? Come dodge the damp and raindrops with me and soon you’ll be locked into the present. The more I hoe, the more I find my compass pointing clear and true. The garden accepts you as you are. It only asks, it only requires that you learn to listen, to quiet yourself ever so slightly.
There's magic to be found in hard work, putting hands to earth and soil. It's a rather strange kind of alchemy we farmers conjure up. Making gold out of shit, food out of seeds, medicine out of plants, nourishment out of starlight and between it all: life. Where does magic end and life begin? Or maybe it is quite elementary. Perhaps the magic is to be found in each simple task at hand, weaving its way through with an invisible golden thread. You make what you sow. You conjure up what you focus on. We forget so easily what the gods of old knew all along: we are the creators, each and every one of us. Today I choose the garden, or does the garden choose me? I know that I know so little of life, but this just feels right somehow. If farming can make an alchemist out of such an unsure, shy, anxious human being as I, what other magic awaits me? Come to the garden I must, this much is certain and so I come. Day after day, I mimic my ancestors, conjuring up healers and growers and makers from centuries past, echoing ancient rituals of old, all the while finding solace in a magic more powerful than I could ever comprehend.
