I’ve been
reading with great interest the articles about the land use argument going on
north of town and it got me thinking about what it means to be a “city slicker”
living in a farm town.
I guess I’ll start with a little background on myself and
what little I really know about farming. Until moving to Winters 15 years ago I
had never lived anywhere that didn’t have a population of at least a couple
hundred thousand people. Anytime I went to the grocery store there was food
available, fresh, frozen, and processed.
In the early 90’s Diane and I had a
café at the Flint Farmers Market in Michigan. We got to know and see how hard
the farmers worked just to make a few bucks. They would spend all week tending
the fields’ then before dawn load up their trucks and head into town, some of
them driving from a few hours away. If their produce didn’t sell then back in
the truck it went along with any chance of a profit.
When we moved to Winters we didn’t
realize how much of an agricultural community this was. We thought it was just
a small town, kind of a suburb of Vacaville. We moved here in June and that
first September my sister in-law who lived in Vacaville got tickets for a fund
raising event called “A day in the country” put on by the Yolo Land Trust. If I
remember correctly it was out at the Hamilton’s property off of Moody Slough
Rd. and we had to drive out these little country roads to get there.
When we got there I was awe struck
by the abundance of fruits and produce that were being showcased. They were
grilling meat and there were wineries pouring wine, I remember Heringer
Vineyards was sampling their first vintage of Petite Sirah out of a small
barrel because it hadn’t been bottled yet and it was so good. I couldn’t
believe that all this came from right around where we now lived. That’s when I
truly realized that we did indeed live in a farming town even though all the
orchards I’d been driving past should have been a clue.
After that I started to appreciate
the guys driving past my house with their farm equipment heading down to the
orchards at the end of Russell Street. The ones wearing the white hazmat suits
and towing the big blower tubes are kind of scary but hey, they were here first.
One of the funniest stories I have
about my ignorance happened shortly after we opened the coffee house. Early one
morning around 6:30 we started hearing and seeing a helicopter flying low over
the creek. My first inclination was to assume it was the police looking for a
criminal. I started asking the few customers coming in if they knew what was
going on and everyone was as bewildered as I was. Then Tom Duncan comes in and
looks at me like I’m an idiot (his usual look) and tells me that they’re just
spraying the walnuts across the creek.
Having the coffee house gave me the
opportunity to get to know some of the local farmers and ranchers, primarily
the younger generation since the old timers didn’t want to leave the round
table at the café.
Now I work for a farming family and that’s given me more
insight into their business and yes, it is a business. The days of subsistence
farming here in America is long past even though we love our gardens and our
chickens too.
My point is that even though I’m an outsider living in a
farming community, I accept the commercial agriculture going on around me and
everything (good & bad) that goes with it. I also see the other side of the
coin where the farmers have to put up with the additional traffic to get their
equipment through town or no parking at the hardware store. The cost of housing
for laborers keeps going up because more of us want to live here and I’m sure so
many other things I haven’t a clue about have changed for them as well.
But living in a community is all about trying to get along
and making compromises even though sometimes we are on opposite sides of the
debate. For me what makes Winters a wonderful place to live is that marriage of
agriculture and tourism. The history, work ethic, and delicious bounty that
comes from our farmers and the restaurants, wineries, and places of beauty that
draws the tourists.
To view the column in it's original form go to page 15 of the following link. Winters Express 9/29/16
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