3 Reason's Why Farmers Markets Matter...

I was raised on a farm and have worked at farmers markets for many years.

What I discovered on my side of the table were the lessons children could learn working behind the counter—rules of basic commerce, confidence through interacting with adults, and the cultivation of presence and self-leadership. I’d hire friends, knowing that working at the market would often lift them out of depression. I learned how to create and nurture a community.

But this post is not about my side of the table. These are the three reasons why farmers markets matter.

1) Healthy communities are best built through small commerce.

At a farmers market, rural meets urban. Two differing perspectives come together. Because of this, sharp edges of being are softened, and more color enters our outlook. We’re asked to interact with people we might not normally meet. Social anxiety eases. We find ourselves a little more out in the world, even though the world has come to us. Our lives feel a bit safer because of that. And we look forward to the next interaction, as awkward as it might sometimes feel

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2) Being one handshake away from your food source means you are two handshakes away from God.

It isn’t Costco, Fred Meyer, or King Soopers. You are one handshake away from someone’s sweat, dirt, decision-making, blood, broken tractor, lost calf, flat tire, or destroyed crop. Grocery stores are convenient precisely because they remove the prospect of death from your choices. The farmer across from you will die someday. And so will you.

That farmer is in service to the sun, moon, rain, thundershowers, floods, insects, fire—all the things insurance companies write off as “acts of God.” A farmer is the ultimate negotiator: a mathematician working with nature’s patterns, and a gambler playing roulette with God.

3) It’s a church without the preacher.

It’s community and communion. Nature’s bounty is laid before us—a product of our labor, our worship, and the bounty of our prayer. An outdoor market, like the seasons and like life itself, comes and goes. Left alone with minimal bureaucratic input, it self-regulates—like nature itself.

It’s fun, colorful, unique. Asymmetrical. Raw. Beautifully alive in its inconsistencies. I would argue with anyone that you don’t leave a farmers market without your heart a little fuller, your step a little lighter, and your cheeks turned upward in a smile.

The reality of farmers markets is this: it costs more. But remember—cheap food isn’t really cheap. The major players in food—dairy, corn, beef, wheat—are heavily subsidized. We all pay for these costs on the back end. And because this system makes food so easy and cheap to access, our appreciation and gratitude for the larger systems of life, and the communal gatherings around the table at home, have suffered.

Meat used to be a Sunday dish due to its lack of easy access. As such, it became a meal to look forward to and appreciate.

To sum, farmers markets are unambiguous.

And you get what you pay for.