My arrival as a new intern at Full Belly Farm coincided with the onset, or better yet the onslaught, of the January rains. My first 9 days here produced almost 10 inches of rain. For people like me who come from the city, rain is easily avoided. It’s something we observe from a safe distance, behind a window, inside a warm and toasty climate-controlled environment. If we have to go outside, well, a windshield wiper here, an umbrella there, and it’s almost as if the rain never happened.

On the farm, however, the rain is a force to be reckoned with, and it has influenced pretty much everything I’ve done. It turned the farm’s already heavy clay soils into a sticky, wet-cement-like goop that threatened to swallow me up with every step. It crept into my “waterproof” raingear no matter how carefully I tried to seal off every opening. It knocked out the power and our water pumps for a day, requiring us to wash the muddy veggies in icy-cold rainwater. It somehow seeped into the trailer of chicken feed, rotting its contents, forcing us to mix and grind a new batch. It caused me to get the forklift stuck in the exact same puddle of mud twice in a span of 30 minutes (okay maybe that was somewhat my fault). It drearily dampened my first farmer’s market. It persistently postponed my painting plans. And it empowered the Cache Creek behind the farm to menacingly rise up in a fit of dirty-brown rage, threatening to breach its banks. It even entered into my dreams: I attempted to ford the river, but was swept away by the overwhelming current and taken for a wild ride….

What I will remember most, though, about these rains happened on the very first morning of my very first day. I headed out with the picking crew in the driving rain and promptly found myself in the middle of a cabbage field with a big, open-topped backpack strapped to my shoulders. My job was basically to just stand there as people tossed cabbages into the bag from every direction. For a moment I actually thought that they had given me the easy job. It turns out that while a few cabbages are no big deal, a full pack of 30 or 40 water-logged Savoys is a weighty proposition. Somehow, I had to lug my bracingly heavy load about 100 yards down the row in my rubber boots and yellow poncho/spacesuit through the deluge of rain and that aforementioned sticky, wet-cement-like goop to a waiting truck, all without falling over and spilling those cabbages like bowling balls into the gutter. With every step, half of my boot would disappear into the muck. I stared straight ahead and struggled forward, resolute and determined, thinking to myself that if all those yoga classes this past year, all those Tulandasana “Balancing-Stick” and Padangustasana “Toe Stand” and Dandayamana Bibhaktapada Janushirasana “Standing Separate Leg Head to Knee” poses were worth anything, absolutely anything at all, then I would stay balanced, stay on my feet, and make it to that truck at the end of the rainbow and unload those cabbages. I was sure that I was going to fall. I felt the eyes of every crew member burning into my back, just waiting for me to tumble over. I could already hear them laughing and retelling the story time and time again; I would never live it down. Right…left…right…left…must…get…cabbages…to…the…truck….

Well, wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles, I made it to that truck. Without falling. Yes, somehow I did it. And as I breathed a sigh of relief and unloaded my precious cargo, I broke out in a big smile. On the farm, the work doesn’t end when it starts to rain. For me especially, the work is just beginning.

- by Rawley Johnson