Give Thanks

As I was feeding my goats the other evening, I noticed that the oldest doe in the herd was getting knocked away from the feed pans. At one time she was a head doe, but age has taken its toll and she’s not as strong as she used to be. This doe has more than earned her keep and she deserves to eat as much as the younger does if not more because I appreciate the work that she’s done for me over the years. So, the soft-hearted part of me goes and stands next to her to keep the others away while she eats her share of feed. These are the farming moments that non-farming people don’t get to experience. Farmers are some of the most caring, attentive people you will find because the wellbeing of their crops and livestock is their life and people depend on them to produce their food. During the hustle and bustle of the holidays, it’s easy to forget where your food came from and that most farmers don’t take days off just because it’s Christmas. Livestock still has to be fed and watered, cows still have to be milked and new life begins regardless of which holiday may be going on.

We’re coming up on the season of caring and giving. Farmers give their lives to a career that they love while a good number of people give them a hard time about the chemicals they use or traffic jams caused by their equipment or the smells their livestock produce. We live in an age where if you ask a kid where their food came from, they’ll say “the store.” People have forgotten where their food and clothing come from or maybe they were never taught. Every spring, we have a few people coming in and they want to grow their first garden or have a raised bed in order to grow their own food. They are so excited to plant and watch their crop grow. Then nature takes place and they come back looking for something to kill the weeds or bugs. They realize that growing their own food is not as easy as just planting a seed. The whole gardening experience has given them a new respect for a farmer’s work and it’s easy to take that hard work for granted.

Here at Robertson Cheatham Farmer’s CO-OP, we are thankful for each and every one of our customers, big and small and we look forward to these customers who are willing to learn how to grow their food or build their fence. A certain sense of accomplishment comes when you go out to the garden, pick some vegetables and prepare them for your family’s supper or when you grow your own beef and take your first bite of that delicious ribeye steak. Your local CO-OP salespeople get that same sense of accomplishment when you let us know that our advice worked or that product that we recommended worked like a dream. Whatever your farming venture, we look forward to helping you navigate through your farming journey.

Seems like last week was Thanksgiving and, in a few weeks, we’ll be celebrating Christmas. Think about your Thanksgiving dinner and how many of those dishes would not have been possible if it weren’t for a farmer. I’m going to bet Christmas dinner will be the same way in that a farmer raised everything on your table. From the cotton tablecloth to the sweet potatoes, the eggs in the chess pie to the beautiful ham sitting in the middle of the table, there was a farmer somewhere that put as much care into producing the food for your holiday dinner as I did to be sure that my older doe got to eat. Remember to thank a farmer when you see one, they have so many obstacles through the year that a little appreciation might be nice for them to hear!

“I will praise God’s name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving.” Psalm 69:30