It’s been a month since I’ve been able to sit down and write. I’ve tried several times mind you, but June is not conducive to writing time. Juneteenth activities and events begin at the end of May and conclude with the Volunteer Appreciation Picnic on July 4th. I hope everyone had a wonderful Juneteenth and 4th of July. Ms. Opal always reminds us that freedom needs to be for everyone – the oppressed and the oppressor – and celebrations should go on from Juneteenth until July 4th.
I rarely get a moment to simply stop and take in the annual 4th of July Volunteer Appreciation Cookout. It’s in it’s fifth year and I’ve never witnessed the fireworks show. I’m usually trying to get cleaned up so I can go home soon after the show is over. It’s a holiday for most folks, but a really long workday for me. Still, I love to take a moment to look at the crowd of folks that come each year. I find joy in that moment as I see the diversity and joy of life in it all.
I look across the crowd and smile. It’s an example for what our neighborhoods and communities could be the other 364 days a year. There are no racial or ethnic barriers, no religious or cultural barriers. Class doesn’t keep people separate from one another. It’s simply a great evening to be shared by everyone. Food and fireworks are great unifiers. Although I’m usually worn out from a long day of preparation and grilling, I really don’t want it to end. Reality hits as the parking lot empties and it will probably be another 365 days until our little community can enjoy another day together.
I need to have the image of unity even if it is only one day of the year. I need the hope that one day we as a people can move beyond the deep divisions that perpetuate the “Us” and “Them” mentality. I need to be reminded that it’s possible for us to experience real community without regard to race, sexual preference, disability, class, or political affiliations. Otherwise, I succumb to a serious case of the “F*** it’s”. I stand on the line between apathy and empathy a lot these days.
Watching the picnic remined me of the prophet Isaiah’s vision of a world where human relationships are rooted in God’s presence:
I will rejoice in Jerusalem
And delight in my people;
No more will the sound of weeping be heard in it,
Or the cry of distress.
No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days,
Or an old person who does not live out a lifetime:…
Before they call I will answer,
While they are yet speaking I will hear.
The wolf and the lamb shall feed together,
The lion shall eat straw like an ox:
But the serpent – its food will be dust!
They shall not hurt or destroy
On all my holy mountain, says the Lord.
Isaiah 65.19-20, 24-25
I live with the hope that day is coming. For now, I’ll enjoy our day of food and fun…
I hope everyone is staying hydrated and healthy now that summer seems to have started in earnest. We’re hanging in there and keeping the summer crops watered to keep bringing you fresh, healthy, LOCAL produce (you can’t get much more local when you’re right next to downtown!).
We have so much to pass on to you all. June has been an amazing month already and Juneteenth is right around the corner. One of the Juneteenth events you shouldn’t miss is the Empowering You – Education, Health, and Job Fair to be held tomorrow and Saturday at the Trinity River Campus of Tarrant County College. See the attached flyer for details and while you’re there, come see us at the Opal’s Farmstand.
Greetings from Opal’s Farm. We will not be at Cowtown Farmers Market this week. The busy Spring planting season came to a bit of a halt this morning. The rain that came in overnight has been great for the farm and not so great for “being under the weather” physically. We will be there next Saturday morning and hate missing the Spring Festival this weekend. Bring your umbrellas and join the fun at Cowtown Farmers Market today!
I can’t stand to miss our family and friends at the market. Over the last five years, Cowtown Farmers Market has truly become family. It’s the highlight of my week. There’s something special about our market and the farmers and vendors who come each week to bring fresh local produce, meats, honey, and all kinds of other local products. I’ve learned so much from the knowledge freely shared by the farmers and friends there.
I grew up in Fort Worth but spent many days at my Uncle Carl’s ranch in South Texas or my Uncle Roof’s dairy farm up towards Boyd. I tend to be more of a carnivore when it comes to diet. That remained the case until I came to Cowtown. You see, Cowtown is unlike the way most folks shop for groceries. People actually stop and talk to one another. No avoiding hurried and harried people with shopping carts and frustration with checkout lines. You won’t find one self-checkout stand at the market; although people may line up because one of our farmers has something special that week (especially when peaches, tomatoes, and blueberries come in).
I’m no vegetarian, nor am I knocking those who are. I still love meat, but Cowtown helped me broaden my food experience. Customers have shared their many ways to cook the fresh produce we bring to market each week and I’ve tried them all (well, most of them anyway). I’ve incorporated many of their recipes into my diet. I even like greens now (except for kale – you all like it so we’ll keep growing it for you – I’m not there yet…).
I hope you will all head out to Cowtown Farmers Market on Saturday mornings. Get to know our local farmers and vendors. Cowtown is a producer-only market. All the farms are within a 150-mile radius of Fort Worth. Everything is truly local. No one is a reseller – getting their produce from a distributor or wholesaler. In other words, we don’t have field tomatoes in January or Brussell Sprouts in August. Learning to eat what’s in season is not only respecting the Earth’s rhythms but benefits overall health as well.
Food is one thing we all have in common. It is to be savored and enjoyed by family and friends and so should shopping for it!
It’s rained about 4 inches in the last two days with more to come. I gratefully sat down to write this morning. It seems like it’s been far too busy to do so given our unseasonably warm winter. The winter crops don’t know what to do – some have even bolted (gone to seed) – and the Spring crops are beginning to poke their heads out of the soil. It’s too muddy to work today so I get to sit back in my office and spend some quality time by myself. My playlist is going, the coffee’s hot, and I have all four dogs curled up around my feet. I can’t think of any place I’d rather be.
My playlist this morning is mostly Texas country. A Matt Hillyer song, “If These Old Bones Could Talk”, came on and I thought about the old box of dominoes in my drawer. It was a gift from my father – a box of old “bones” white with black pips and embossed with the green logo of Burlington Northern Railroad – a gift from the Burlington Northern Veterans Club (long before BNSF). The white marble-like dominoes are slightly discolored from years of body oils they’ve absorbed from years of shuffling and playing. It’s one of the few things I’ve managed to hang on to despite the chaos of active addiction that plagued me for so long.
Dad’s been gone since 2002 and I got clean and sober in 2005. The old box of bones is one of the few constants in my life – one that has seen the best of days and the worst of days. I’ve really been thinking about Dad this morning. I wish he could have lived to see me today. My wife reminds me that he does see me. I get it. It’s not the same though. I miss him. It’s my earthly father’s love that taught me how much my heavenly Father loves me. But I digress…
My dad was a railroad man. He worked for the old Fort Worth & Denver Railroad, which was owned by the Colorado & Southern Railroad was in turn, owned by the old Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad. Long before the merger with the Santa Fe Railroad – the SF in BNSF – was a merger with the Burlington Route and the Great Northern Railroad (among others) in 1970. My father could tell you the complete history and even had pictures of the old Fort Worth & Denver and Burlington Route trains as they moved through the train yards and stations. He took “early” retirement in 1981 at age fifty-seven and forty years of service. For many years afterwards he and mom attended the various BN Veterans dinners. Railroading is a different way of life – a subculture difficult to explain to outsiders. The railroad is family.
Our other family was the Church of Christ, a non-denominational body that has churches all through the state. That’s where the dominoes come in. First of all, please understand that dominoes, specifically the game of “Forty-Two”, is the state game of Texas (by a law passed in 2011). They even have a State Championship played in Halletsville, Texas every year. Texans, especially in protestant religious organizations like the Church of Christ and old railroaders take dominoes seriously.
Our family has deep roots within the Church of Christ. My great- great-grandfather was a travelling circuit preacher. My great-grandfather was a farmer and helped build the church in Navarro and Ellis counties. My parents and the majority of their friends were members of the Church of Christ and most of them grew up together. Since they were good church folks none of them played cards. That was the devil’s game. I’m told that dominoes were invented in the 1880s as a way to play cards without cards. Good fundamentalist Christians are good at finding loopholes to what they deem poor moral behavior…
My parents and all their friends would get together every month to have a “Forty-Two” night. It would always be held at someone’s house (never play games in the church building) and would include a huge potluck. Everyone would come, multiple tables would be set up, and parents would break off into tables of four to play. Kids would be running all over the yard (we still played outside – even after dark – back them). During the occasional game break one or more of the parents would come out to check on us and then return to the next game. They’d play all night – at least ten o’clock – and us kids got to stay up late. It was a win-win for everyone.
Dominoes disappeared after my dad was transferred to Denver (when the Colorado & Southern bought the Fort Worth & Denver ) – that is until they discovered a host of ex-patriate Texans and Church of Christ folks who became their new circle of friends. They got together religiously (no pun intended) on most holidays and Friday nights to play “Forty-Two”. The location changed but the game remained the same.
I had become a teenager with better things to do than hang out with the “old folks” playing dominoes. I probably should’ve have stayed. It might’ve prevented a lot of bad choices. I never learned how to play “Forty-Two” and the kids I met in Colorado weren’t much interested in “shaking the bones”. It was the seventies and as I got older life became about sex, and drugs, and rock & roll, but that’s a story for another time.
Fast forward to my return to Texas as a young adult. I played a lot of dominoes down in the ‘hood with my using friends. It was never “Forty-Two”, but it was “straight” dominoes. Later, my recovery friends often played after recovery meetings, and I would play with my two sons occasionally (Jeremy always found a way to win but I never caught him cheating…).
I don’t play dominoes as much as I used to. Life has gotten full of good things, but it leaves me little time for the game. Besides, many of my old friends who played have either moved off or passed on. I’m sure my grandkids know how to play and next week is Spring Break. I think I’ll shuffle the old bones and see how well Jeremy taught them how to play. After all, the game remains the same.
A huge thank you needs to go out to all the folks that came out to Cowtown Farmers Market yesterday. The weather was outstanding and it was so good to see so many of our old friends who stayed home over the winter. We had new vendors and some returning old ones. The Black Rooster Bakery sat up right next to us after their winter leave. I’m not sure it was such a great thing on my budget though. Joey and I certainly didn’t go hungry yesterday…
Speaking of not going hungry – Brushy Creek Farms has returned to Cowtown after a winter break and more of our produce vendors will be coming back as Spring moves forward. If we don’t have what you’re looking for then one of our other farms should be able to help you out.
We’ve had an exciting week at Opal’s Farm. Our BCS tractor is back from its Spring servicing at Homestead Equipment down by Waco. They are the only BCS dealership in Texas but well worth any drive you may have if you’re purchasing new equipment or servicing old ones. We’d love to say a heartfelt thank you as we were able to finish our tomato beds and start on the rest of the Spring crop beds.
We also had a special visitor this week. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen a Bald Eagle at the farm. When he first flew by, I thought it was one of the Turkey Vultures we see daily. When he got closer, I realized what I was seeing. He was a majestic sight as he flew to perch on the giant utility pole at the south end of the farm. I tried to get a good picture but honestly, I’m not much of a photographer and I couldn’t get the light right. What you see is what you get unfortunately. I tried later when he was by the river, but he took off before I could capture a good image. I hope he finds us a good space to hunt at Opal’s Farm. We’d love to have him back.
We’d also love to give a shout out to all our volunteers returning after a long winter! The warm days we’ve experienced have brought some our old friends out and more are coming. We hope you can come enjoy Spring planting with us.
I get to see the gorgeous weather outside my office window, but I’m reminded that it’s only March 3rd. North Texas weather has a way of fooling everyone into a false sense of “Spring Fever”. The last frost date is supposed to be March 18th so maybe, just maybe, Spring is setting in…
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