I received an email a couple of days ago with a song written by a former student, Van Harting. I had taught Van when he was in first and second grade back in 2004-2006. I love the song and its called Carrot Day Massachusetts. Listen to it in the link below https://vanwilliamharting.bandcamp.com/track/carrot-day-massachusetts.

What an honor to have a song based on the ideas and stories shared here on this blog. There is something that comes from the compression that comes in a song that gets to the heart of things.

“It’s why I sow hope in spring
Comes each year, don’t cost a thing
Sometimes promises they manifest
Sometimes they come to nothing”

That is right, sometimes things work out in the garden and sometimes they don’t. Sometimes things work out in your day and sometimes they don’t. Hope does come in spring, even cold springs like this one and hope comes every time you plant a crop. I hope to make the goal of sending out seeds to 100 folks and 33 folks have used this form already. Sometimes you make your goal and sometimes you don’t. Here is hoping you listen to the song and order your free seeds. They don’t cost a thing.

Back in the fall of 2004, when Van was in first grade, I had already grown carrots with The Garden Project at South Shore for five or six years but it was not yet a formal celebration. We didn’t wait for the frost and we didn’t eat the carrots ceremoniously. We just picked them, washed them, and ate them. 

 On November 3rd 2004 the class went to visit Holly Hill Farm as we did every Wednesday afternoon and probably before the first frost the students picked and ate carrots. As was our way the next day the students in first and second grade wrote about their experiences while the Kindergarteners drew about theirs. It just so happened that I still have the writing that the students did that day as Heidi Harting and I turned our trips to Holly HIll Farm into a book with the students’ writing, their drawings and Hiedi’s amazing photographs. November 3rd was a windy day and below are photographs of the pages in the book with the writing that they made the next day at school on November 4th. I am so proud that we always started each visit with a circle where we would focus on a sense. That day it seems like it was listening as you can see by our postures and the students’ beautiful writing. Type is small but I hope you read it.

I am very grateful to have been able to grow food with students and proud of who they have become and proud of who they were. Hope you order your seeds. Thanks Van for the song. I love it. Thanks Heidi for the book and thanks Jean and Frank White and Jonny Belber for those fabulous days.