Sitting in a restaurant with friends, sucking down the closest thing to sweet tea I’ve had since I moved to Missouri, a friend asked me what I planned to do after college. More specifically, “Jillian, are you going to be a farmer?”
Cue the jaw dropping moment.
As I scrambled for words and tried to halt the runaway train that was my mind, I managed to stutter out something like, “Heck no! I couldn’t do that everyday!”
I received several puzzled looks. I mean I talk about the farm A LOT and now I’m vehemently denying my affection for the ground that holds my family’s blood, sweat and tears?
Let’s just say I had a slight communication problem. Or better yet—the thoughts I was thinking weren’t translating well into words.
Behind my bumbling reply, my new friends did not realize how deep a question they had asked me. It’s a question I have asked myself many times through out the years: Do I want to be a farmer?
I grew up on a farm—but my parents aren’t farmers. We lived across the road from my grandparents, on their farm. So I spent my summer days riding in the tractor with Pa, shelling peas with Ma and swinging under our oak tree. It was the best way to grow up.
Pa and Ma-- they still don't know what to do with their
two granddaughters who wear jeans and cowboy boots to church
As I got older and more involved with FFA, I decided that I wanted to contribute to the farm like my older boy cousin and brother did. After all, my brother had been driving the tractor since he was tall enough to reach the clutch—I should be able to as well.
My desire to learn to drive the tractor was met with resistance. And resistance went by the name “Pa.” While I don’t ever remember him telling me he didn’t want me helping—I kinda got the sense that I might have been out of place. Statements about my biscuit making abilities really put a burr under my saddle (because every southern girl “should know how to make biscuits from scratch.”) I was mad and I was bullheaded—which isn’t a good combination.
I resolved that if someone wouldn’t teach me—I would figure it out by myself. I spent the summer after that- one step behind Pa and always looking over his shoulder. I have never learned more than I did then.
Though I don’t know when it happened Pa finally warmed to the idea of letting me help out some on the farm. Granted my role was still small, but the knowledge I gained that summer when I stubbornly followed him around, helped me a few years down the road when I was looking for a job. It is still helping me today—I may not remember where every grease fitting on that old peanut picker was—but I can sure explain how it works and more importantly where my food comes from.
So, as I came back to reality—sitting in a little Missouri restaurant drinking unsweet “sweet tea,” I realized how far society had come. Generations ago people assumed that women should help on the farm but not run it. Today, my friends had sincerely asked if I was going to farm on my own. Though I have decided not to be the main operator of a farm (it’s just not my dream) I was proud to hear the tide was changing and that agriculture had truly opened up to women.
And for that—I’ve never been happier.
For more information on women’s roles in agriculture visit:
2007 Census of Ag
Women in Agriculture
American National CattleWomen, Inc.
Farm Mom of the Year
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