Some things just stick out in your mind. In the tenth grade a student complained in French class concerning the way a sentence was framed in the text book.
"No one talks that way!", she said in an exasperated tone. The teacher gently responded, "You have to remember that not everyone lives in Smithfield." The implications of that statement were among the most important parts of my high school education.
It was not long after that that I saw a copy of the Richmond Afro. I had never before seen a Black newspaper. Up to that point I genuinely did not understand that there could be different racial and cultural perspectives on things that I had simply been taught were facts.
It was at about this time that I stopped thinking as a child.
Years of studying religion at William and Mary made it easier to understand different cultural perspectives. My years of working at Jamestown and studying the culture of the the people of Tsennacomacah who were ruled by the Powhatan helped me understand that different cultures could be completely divergent on such things as whether time ran in a straight line or was circular.
Years ago I took a young man hunting with me who was from Fairfax, the Virginia county that perhaps most exemplifies suburbanism. As we went around the edge of a field, he saw tonnes of old farm equipment, appliances, and perhaps thirty years of material acquisition rusting and peeking out through the sand in what had been a deep, ugly erosion scar on the steep slope of the hill.
He was shocked. "That looks like a mini-junkyard."
I told him about how farmers during the Depression learned the importance of soil conservation as they watched the Dust Bowl envelop the West. I explained that for the first time farmers set in and fought erosion with every thing in their arsenal. I got excited as I discussed it, as I usually do. I find it to be the most ironic environmental good news that one could find--using junk to save the soil.
I explained to him how it worked and worked fast to heal the soil. I explained to him what had been happening as corrosive gullies destroyed small acreage fields. I explained to him how, by working very hard, these farmers had defeated a destructive force of nature.
He did not share my enthusiasm. "Yeah, but it looks bad. Something ought to be done about it,' he explained to me, using small words so that I could understand
It is not fair for me to expect modern suburbanites and those who have been away from the soil for generations to understand the vast cultural differences between their culture and mine. My culture has its roots in post Civil War small farms. Modern suburbanite culture traces its roots to the 1950's during a time when order, appearances, and adherence to rules and regulations lead to homogeneous suburbs.
The ultimate fruit of modern suburbanite culture is the homeowners association and its role in determining and enforcing standards of appearance for the neighborhood. Farmers never had home owner's associations. We can barely stomach zoning laws (unless they protect us from having a housing development built in the community).
It would be easy to assume, without giving it a thought, that as a highly educated professional living and educated in America, eating suburban food and watching many of the same TV shows, that my core values would be in line with that of mainstream suburban values.
But that is not how it works.
My Welsh ancestors settled within 10 miles of the horse lot in 1635. To my knowledge, from then until now, I have only had one male ancestor in my direct line who never was a farmer. My culture is fading fast. When I was a child at least 25% of the natives here still pronounced their words in keeping with their Elizabethan and African roots. I do not know of anyone with an advanced degree in my generation that still does so..but me. As I child I grew up surrounded by farms and farmers. Now I am still surrounded by farms, but the number of farmers who work that land has dwindled to just a handful--still a lot of land to be worked but worked by only a few people.
We are now a small minority that is quickly being swallowed up by the dominant culture. Such is simply the way that societies work. I have resigned myself, when off of the horse lot, to making adjustments to this culture. The population of my county has doubled in my life time. People routinely move into the county and pronounce the names of their roads (we never had "streets", we always made due with "roads") and communities different than they have been pronounced for the last three hundred years. It is a bit entertaining to watch as they try so earnestly to help me understand that we have been pronouncing these words wrong all along.
White suburbanite culture has never lacked confidence in its belief that its values were not only the best values, they were in fact the only values, that were worth understanding. Daddy is one of the last people living around here who actually plowed horses in the field as a very young child. He was a farrier for fifty years. He trained endless numbers of horses, ponies and mules to saddle and to plow, and to pull buggies and sulkys. But that was never enough to stop people, who might have a string of horse training dvds that they purchased to help them train their first horse, from explaining to Daddy that he must not have developed "relationships" with his horses as well as they are doing with their first horse.
I am convinced that in order for our program to succeed it must be governed by the best aspects of my cultural roots. Any other option will lead to making the appearance of the place a matter of highest priority. That will cut the heart out of what we do. I am very much in favor of man made beauty as long as it is functional. Our shelter around the round pen will be a great example of functional beauty. It will be unique and it will serve as an educational opportunity to teach about native vines.
For several hundred years we grew up believing that the solution to problems was to work, to work hard, and to earn what ever might temporally pass through our hands. As far as I know I do not own any stock, bonds, or have any investments. I have never bought a lottery ticket. We were not raised to admire wealth. The best thing that was ever to be said about a person in the community who acquired significant farm land was that he "earned every penny that he ever had." On the other end of the spectrum, one of the worst things to say of a wealthy person was that he "never worked a day in his life."
I have to admit that the idea of stopping work to tidy up is a most peculiar concept to me.
I cannot get any satisfaction from how the surface of land looks if I know that beneath the surface the soil has been compacted, polluted, overgrazed and abused. Allowing erosion and loss of soil to occur is something that I find abhorrent. I believe that it reflects poorly on our program and poorly on me. Erosion is controlled wonderfully by simply tossing large handfuls of hay string in eroded spots where the water cascades during thunderstorms. The string slows the water enough to allow the dirt in it to settle to the bottom and the deep ugly gash fills itself.
Modern suburban culture cannot understand why I would be so very ashamed of myself if I replaced my missing tooth.
I knew an old farmer in our community who would trade in his car for another one as the need developed. He was a very hard working man and spent his money well. The sales man pushed hard for him to take a more prestigious model car than the one that he wanted. Finely the old farmer agreed to try out the luxury car.
After a short while he brought the car back to the dealership.
The price was not the problem. He explained to the sales man that he just was "not the kind of man to have a car like that." The salesman was confused. I suspect that what he thought was that the old farmer did not believe that he was good enough to be seen in a luxury car. Modest though he was, the farmer, if pressed would have had to explain that the problem was that he was too good of a man to be seen driving around in a luxury car.
