Amy's Garden

A few weekends ago on a post rainy, cloudy summer morning I visited Amy's Garden in Charles City.

I was so incredibly drawn to this beautiful place for a couple of reasons.

I believe in what Amy is doing. I believe that good, wholesome food is important and I love that she is working so hard to bring it to our community. Amy and her family farm 10 acres of organic food and flowers and deliver everything to farmer's markets and grocery stores.

Being there also brought back fond memories I have of summer visits with my grandfather. There, he lived on acres and acres of land and grew almost all of his own food and raised pigs and cows. I can still remember the high "mystery" surrounding the slaughter of a hog (I wasn't allowed to actually witness that part) and later seeing its severed head plopped up on a barrel next to the barn. Even then I realized that what I was seeing was sustenance for family for the next month. No worries. Besides, I'm a meat eater from way back. That was good looking bacon to me.

I was a young kid then who's normal life consisted of cement sidewalks, city traffic, and frequent short walks through the urban jungle to get to the corner grocery story. So these visits to "the wilderness" every summer were exotic, hypnotic…breathtaking, to me.

I'd run around the fields surrounding his modest home and play from morning until night barely stopping to eat except for the three squares that my grandmother called us in for. Snacks between those meals were likely pulled from a nearby fruit tree or bush. I can still remember plucking handfuls of berries from prolific blueberry bushes until I was ready to burst! These are some of my favorite summer memories!

Good times.

And on our next trip to the grocery store, Amy was there!