Every Day Is Ag Day

 

Tuesday was National Ag Day. This sometimes-ag blogger didn't purposefully ignore it. I just didn't have an Ag Day blog ready to go, so I published something else. Poor planning on my part? Perhaps. But, I think it's OK.

I try to work ahead on my blog posts. Monday was busy. Besides my normal KFRM Central Kansas report and a blog post after a fire at our old high school, I helped serve a funeral dinner at church, accompanied at middle school choir and left school a few minutes early so I could be back to the church to sing at the funeral.

I poured coffee. I refilled water glasses. I scraped plates and washed dishes alongside my church friends.  I played a too-fast-for-me accompaniment for a boys' ensemble. I sang at a friend's memorial service.

I didn't have time to write about being part of an agricultural community that day. I was living it.

Usually at harvest time, there's a story in the local newspaper about a community coming together to harvest an ailing neighbor's fields. But it happens quietly many days.

Sometimes, we're on the receiving end.

Sometimes, we're on the giving end.

It's part of what it means to be living and working in a small, rural community.

So, no, I didn't blog about National Ag Day on Tuesday. I probably missed the opportunity to join a hashtag movement (if only I understood Twitter's hashtags) or piggyback onto some other form of publicity for myself, though I have no illusions that I'll become the next Pioneer Woman anyway.

I could have told you lots of interesting facts. For example (from the Corn & Soybean Digest):

• The U.S. farmer of today produces enough food and fiber for approximately 160 people. This number was 19 people in 1940, 46 people in 1960, and 115 people in 1980.
• Farmers receive just under 16¢ of every consumer dollar that is spent on food. The other 84¢ is spent on processing, packaging, marketing, transportation, distribution and retail costs of the food supply.

But, instead of chastising myself for my lack of pre-planning,  I'd like to think I jumped on the Ag Day bandwagon early when I hosted Flat Aggie from a fourth grade classroom in California. I was celebrating Ag Day when I helped my husband work baby calves three days last week during my "spring break" from my school accompanying job.

Randy did more of the heavy lifting than I did!

Every day is Ag Day for Randy, who works to provide food, fuel and fiber through crops and livestock. Every day is Ag Day for me, whether I'm helping with cattle tasks or delivering meals. It could be via  my KFRM Central Kansas reports and through Kim's County Line, where I offer a glimpse at one Kansas farm family by featuring farming, family, faith, food and photography.

 

It could be like I spent Monday, not specifically involved in agriculture, but being a part of a rural community.

Some day, I hope my kids and grandkids will use this as a record of our lives on this piece of God's earth on the Stafford/Reno County Line. And I hope they'll know it was more than just statistics. It was a way of life.

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I'm linked to the Country Fair Blog Hop via Nicole's Tales of a Kansas Farm Mom. Click on the link for more news from the country.