New Blog Outlet!

Hey gang! Just wanted to share something amazing with y'all-- it's called AGazine.

 AGazine is the blog outlet for Auburn University College of Ag. It features several Ag Comm students who talk about everything--from AGventures to internships and foreign countries.

So when you get time--check it out. It's definitely worth the read!

Football gets in the way of blogging...

Hey Gang!

So it feels like forty-forevers since my last post. My deepest apologies for the lack of updates. Instead of writing a long drawn out post about life back on the Plains (which is SEC speak for Auburn University) I figured I'd share a few pictures.

Enjoying the game SEC style--in sundresses!

Auburn University Marching Band--Arkansas State Game

BYOTP: Bring Your Own Toilet Paper---Toomer's Corner

So far this has been an amazing semester, but between football, work and school, it has been nearly impossible to get a blog post up exclusively for this site. But don't give up on me--you will continue to see posts here as well as in a new outlet.

AU College of Ag is launching a new blog site--which I will be contributing to. I hope you'll check out the new AU site to catch my posts and blogs from other ag students.When I find out the "official" link I'll pass it along.

Until then--

WAR EAGLE!

Reality Check: Women Farmers?

There have been very few moments in my life when my mouth fell open in disbelief. I’ve never been a person of few words---much less speechlessness. Last week though I met an occasion for both.

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

"It Keeps Me Turning Home..."

It is amazing how smells can take you back to another place… Today, I was walking out of the office and a diesel truck drove past. Its smutty exhaust attacked my olfactory sense and I was transported back to the farm. It brought me back to one particular day when I was doing my “girl’s work” of leveling out peanut wagons.


Our old tractors were creeping by pulling peanut pickers, my brother Wesley was “setting” wagons and I was sweating like a mule, thigh deep in peanuts with a shovel. Trying to convince myself that there were no snakes in the trailer with me.

Not a very glamorous memory—but a good memory none the less.

I love farm life--and farm memories!

You see, to call our farm a peanut “operation” might be a stretch. Yes we farm. We have peanuts. We “operate” tractors. But in my mind—operation sounds HUGE—and at the time we were still using two-row peanut pickers.

But the great thing about memories is size doesn’t matter. I can still see, clear as day, those tractors and Lilliston pickers creeping their way down the row from the top of that peanut wagon. It’s a good memory—it’s helped me through many hard times. Remembering my family and our way of life has kept me grounded throughout all my adventures. Remembering the long hours my grandpa and uncle put in on the farm makes me appreciate the life I live as well as the food I eat.

But enough reminiscing.

I had another moment of transportation last week—this time I actually went somewhere: home!

I spent the holiday weekend with my family: cooking out, eating, going to movies, eating, singing around the piano, eating, playing with the baby… and did I mention eating?

It's not a family get together with out Bluebell Ice Cream!

Holidays around my house ALWAYS include massive amounts of food. What can I say—EVERYONE in my family knows how to cook! (Well—my skills are questionable) So we spent the weekend enjoying good meals and lots of friends and family at the house.

My uber-cool niece

I also spent my weekend checking out the crops. I was impressed to see how great my fiancé’s dry land cotton looked as well as the peanuts. However the corn—was not what I expected. I guess I forgot that North Florida/Lower Alabama aren’t exactly part of the Corn Belt—and it showed. The lack of rain on our sandy soil had really taken its toll. Overall though, I was thrilled to see the progress of ours and our neighbor’s peanut and cotton crops. (The beans I saw didn’t look half bad either!)

Deltapine Cotton--Florida

FL07 Peantus--Alabama

I’ve only got a few weeks of my internship here in the Midwest left—and though I enjoyed being home, I missed my STL friends… and corn—really tall, lush green corn.

I never thought I’d say that.

Until next time—keep it between the ditches

PS--If you haven't heard the new song by David Nail, "Turning Home" you should check it out!

Homesick? Not really...

It never ceases to amaze me how I can miss home SO MUCH one moment and fall in love with another place the next.




There are TONS of things I miss about home: peanuts, walking barefoot down dirt roads, the Chattahoochee River, the sound of the wind singing in the pine trees... there are a lifetime of memories living in the land, the land I was raised on. Some days I miss it so much I physically hurt.



This past weekend though, I had the chance to visit my roommate’s Illinois farm. It was there, standing on her back porch that I fell in love... again.



The land stretched out before me farther than any I had ever seen before--it was as if the sky was twice the size of the sky at home. The corn rows were never ending. Barely visible, in the distance, were wind turbines.

Yep, I was sold.



I spent the rest of the weekend dodging rain showers, hanging out with her family and enjoying Midwest delicacies (AKA Pork Burgers--why hasn't the South figured this one out yet?!) I realized that it wasn't so much that Florida dirt that I missed but the community and care of agriculture life; the knowledge that things are not as bad as they seem, especially when there's cake at home and family to laugh with. I missed knowing that people pay attention to what others do (yes, I suppose I miss small town gossip a bit) and truly care about their well being.



Let me just tell you folks, that can be hard to come by in the city... unless maybe you were raised there.



There's just something about farm life that makes living and growing up a reckless-safe adventure. An oxymoron, I know... reckless in the fact that you have the freedom to be innovative, to build a better mouse trap, to find a way to get just as much work done using a simpler method. Reckless-- because there is a whole wild world to explore and it starts at your back porch. Reckless--because life dependent on nature has to be, it's anything but reliable.



Farm life is also safe. I remember coming home so cotton-pickin' mad that all I wanted to do was go fast... and most of the time my grandparents (Ma and Pa--no one really has "grandparents" in the South) kept me grounded. I was hard headed and stubborn, but their love cultivated me into the person I am today. (Along with the rest of the "village") They didn't always understand my restlessness or my love for FFA or accept the fact that I enjoy driving tractors and showing cows... but they were always there. They always knew what to say (not always when to stop but that's a different story... =)



It was this weekend I realized why I was homesick. I missed the reckless/safe life I had been privileged to live at home. It has made me more determined than ever to return to it, and offer it as a gift to my kids one day.



So, to answer the 4,329 questions from Facebook: No, I have no big city notions. I like the farm just fine--and I hope to be back there for good in about a year =)



Love y'all all

J

My Rambling Brat

I figured it was high time that I introduced y'all to a few of my “rambling brats” (and if you didn’t get that literary allusion… well let’s just say I feel sorry for ya! You’re missing out!)

My Old Hairbrush

Faded and worn, my old hairbrush lies

Bristles broken,

At odd angles pokin’,

My scalp as it flies…

My hair is my glory,

(I’ll not lie—I’m vain)

These dark tresses mark who I am

And give meaning to my name.

Once long and silky, with hints of red;

Yes it charmed many a lad,

(Surprised most is still on my head!)

But time has passed,

(As time always has)

And my hair, I’ve noticed, it changing fast!

Grey flecks have taken over, where red use to be

It’s coarser now, it no longer defines me

As that sassy young girl, with boys all in tow,

But as a stoic old woman—Now eating her crow!

____________________________________________________________

The Violent Hour

There is a mystery that blooms in the violent hour

When my hands are tangled in your long, sweet hair

And the air grows thin, til your gasping for air

There a sparsely covered tree grows, with long dark limbs

And on it booms a mystery scent from heaven

Scents that are rich like cedar and fresh rain drops

that taste like ash bark,

With a beauty like smoke on the wind

Here a flower blooms, for a short while

And is crushed in the fall

_____________________________________________________

if i had a piano

if i had a piano

i’d play my troubles away

i’d play and play my piano

right through the break of day

and when the sun set low

behind pink and orange clouds

i’d play something slow, slow

On a personal note, I'm adventuring to Central Illinois this weekend! Pictures to come--farm pictures!!!

Notes from the Road: Illinois State FFA Convention

Greetings from Illinois!

I've had the AWESOME opportunity this week to work the Monsanto booth at the Illinois State FFA Convention... and let me tell you that when I say AWESOME I mean AWESOME!

FFA has always been a huge part of my life, in fact for several years in high school FFA was my life; and though I've been out of the program for quite a while now, I was reminded this week that it doesn't matter what state or chapter you're from the FFA knows how to build leaders.


So long for now! I've got a crowd of kids in the blue and gold waiting on Monsanto hats!