ART & POETRY BY PAUL & KATHY BOECHER

Today I’m grateful for farms and the family farmers that continue to operate throughout our land. Those who have stayed with it during times of plenty and times of loss. I didn’t grow up on a farm, but I spent a lot of time on the one my mother spent her childhood years enjoying. Almost every summer my sister and I would board the Milwaukee Road train and travel to grandma and grandpa’s farm. Imagine sending two young girls off on a train without a chaperone. Times were obviously very different then. The sound of the train rolling over tracks of steel as steam poured out of its sides. The chug-a-lug created a rhythm all its own as we sat in our seats looking out over the great expanse of prairie land, dotted with family farmsteads of various sizes and shapes. Fields were freshly plowed, waiting to be planted. The rich, black soil lined with rows for planting. Every child should have an experience on a farm. Even if it’s for a short time. It’s like being in a different time and place. Watching cows being milked by hand, as grandma would occasionally squirt some towards a feral cat or two. Seeing the plants grow over time and being harvested in late August. There’s nothing like it. Life on a farm isn’t easy, especially today with so many of them being sold to large corporations. I give the farmers who stuck with it, a lot of credit for their faith and perseverance. As Paul and I would take our little road trips, we we’d often stop to take a photo of some of these older operations. Paul enjoyed using them as subject matter for a lot of his paintings. So, today thank a farmer for continuing to provide food for our tables and a lot of fond memories.

The soil is rich for planting. The land provides for crops.

We take so much for granted when strolling through the shops.

Does meat appear in plastic – do eggs show up in crates?

The food goes through some changes before it hits our plates.

Farmers rise up with the sun, to care of all our needs.

They plow fields and milk the cows and some will plant the seeds.

When you sit down to dinner, be sure to bow your head,

Thank God He gives us farmers to give us daily bread.