I love digging in the dirt, doubling digging (digging down two depths) even. I really do. And if anyone would have asked me that five years ago I’d have looked at them cross-eyed, looked left then right and wondered who exactly they were talking to. But things change and they surely did once I became a volunteer at Earthly Delights. Long before I got started digging, I was a new CSA member: new to having a vegetable subscription and new to eating vegetables, well ones directly out of the dirt anyway. I wasn’t even sure what to do with some of the vegetables; some of them I’d never even heard of: kale, kohlrabi, and jerusalem artichokes anyone? I would hurry home with my share with great expectations, only to dig them out of the bottom of the fridge, rotting away two weeks later. After cautiously trying some new recipes and mimicking Casey’s delicious lunches I learned how amazing these crazy looking treasures were. No more uneaten greens in the compost now.

Not long after being a CSA newbie, I was enticed into working at the farm. After working in a cubicle for ten hours a day the garden looked like heaven on earth. I was invited to volunteer and I jumped at the chance. A few years later I was signed up as an intern, to not only be a digger but to learn from seed to harvest how all the magic works.

The first intern day, a chilly day in early springl was just the beginning of an awesome (and sometimes grueling) spring/summer adventure. Farmer Casey and Farmer Lori, as I like to call them, were a great duo. Casey full of energy and vigor early in the morning; I’ve never met more of an A.M. person in my life, was a great teacher at describing everything from compost science to names of local edible “weeds”. Lori full of patience, wisdom, and perfectly timed subtle humor selected radical intelligent articles about growing food, showed me how to pick the perfect tomato among many other harvesting tricks, and shared the best veggie frittata I’ve ever had.

And I know as I write this big long thing I will sound more and more like a hallmark card but I am being completely honest. The other interns became like my second family. There is nothing like bonding over back breaking work: from huddling under a tree washing the harvest in the middle of a late summer rain storm to pitch forking horse manure from the truck into wheel barrows, wheel barrow by wheel barrow to the garden beds.

Twice a week we would gather together over a beautiful lunch harvested by our very own hands to discuss the trials and tribulations of farming and life. Daily life really can be that good. Thank you Monica, Crystal, Tawnya, Bob, Casey, and Lori for helping me remember what us humans are here for.