MEGAN STONE
MASSACHUSETTS
Megan is 43 years old and has been farm working since 2015. Before that she was working at the farmers’ markets in NYC. She currently is in her 4th season working on a farm and seed saving operation in Westport, MA.
WHAT ARE YOU CURRENTLY DOING? (WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN WORKING, ETC)
I work for a family, a married couple. I’ve been with them for four seasons. When we started at the beginning of this year, it was two businesses. The wife ran the market vegetable farm, no animals or farmers’ markets, they do a plant sale and sell to restaurants over the season. The husband ran a non-profit where we grow crops to go to seed. We have some seed contracts and some of it is growing plants to help grow seeds to help rematriate them to certain tribes to help with food solidarity and sustainability and independence. We do some breeding projects, we have some beets and some tomatoes that have not been shared with the farming community, yet. . He is really passionate about seeds - working backwards from F1 hybrid and genetic markers and people trying to own plant genetics to build back the food supply. In the beginning of the year I worked for both of them. Now that we’ve come to the end of the season, there will be no more market farm.
They are putting together what they are going to do next year. They are going to lean very hard into the non-profit.
They were very nice to be honest with me about a month ago and to tell me that they can’t offer me anything next year because they don’t know what the business is gonna look like. As we’ve moved ahead in the last 4 weeks, it seems like there will be some work for me over the winter and into the next year, so I’m going to stay with them. But things are really up in the air as far as the business is concerned. Hopefully next year I will be part of the seed non-profit and help with the plant sale.
It was kind of an accident to join them. I had left farming and I tried a different career. I just wanted a workshare, just to work four hours a week on a farm and be paid in food. I thought I was going to be doing something different for the rest of my life.
I applied at one farm, she was a flower farm, and she suggested a friend of hers that hadn’t posted anything anywhere. That is how I met Bill and Dee. That was four seasons ago.
That’s what I did the first year, I did a work share and then they started paying me and we became friends and then I went to work at a different farm because they didn’t have the hours. They were running it themselves with a couple of volunteers. At that point I decided I wanted to go back to farming full-time. Then I got pregnant and worked all the way up until I had the baby. I went back to work just in time to plant garlic and pick potatoes; then the season was over. So I’ve done something for them every season for four years.
HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN FARMING?
I’ve been farming technically since 2015, that is when I applied for an internship on a farm in Rhode island.
WHAT BROUGHT YOU TO FARMING?
I went to college in NYC. When I graduated from college I needed to take a break from academia. I had a friend who had been working at the NYC greenmarkets for a family bakery. she wanted to leave her job so she gave me her job selling baked goods for this family bakery. I ended up working for them for a very long time. I kind of still work for them in some capacities. My ego got really tired of people accusing me of being insincere and inauthentic at the farmers’ market. People would say, ‘it’s a farmers’ market, not a bakers’ market’. People would get frustrated in February where the only vendors at the downtown Brooklyn market were the apple farmers and bakers. Some people just never really get the seasonality of slow food and locally produced food. I just looked around and thought the farmers were having more fun.
My dad was a very serious gardener when I was a kid. He has a lot to do with my relationship with dirt, and just the fact that I’m the happiest when I’m digging in the dirt and my hands are dirty. I like coming home tired and dirty. There is meaning in growing food. I’ve tried to work in “real jobs” and I’m just not happy working indoors. I’m an outdoor animal. I am a manual labor person. I need to move my body when I work. Those jobs people have where they just move fake money around, I would be exhausted trying to find meaning in my life. What I was supposed to do in academia became less attractive to me and I became really passionate about becoming a farmer myself. I applied for an internship, with the intention of learning how to do it myself so that I could learn properly and work my own land and become an independent farmer-owner.
The story was heartbreaking. My life is really different now and I’ve healed from a lot of it. In 2016 I went back for a second year on the same farm I interned with(something I do not recommend; it is best to move on). At the end of that year was given the offer from another farmer - he didn’t have a succession plan, he and his wife wanted to retire and they lived on the property and their children didn’t want to take over the farm. They didn’t want the farm to just grow weeds, they wanted to see the land get worked. This couple had seen me at a particular farmers’ market. I was really honored when they asked me if I wanted to work their land and rent it from them. They would give me their spot at the farmers’ market. They gave me a farm and a retail outlet and a name. But I didn't have a place to live. In order to have a place to live, I needed to get a second job and once I had the second job, I couldn’t be a full-time farmer and I lost the opportunity.
I left farming for two years. I considered myself an absolute failure. I tried to work in the cannabis industry. I thought that was a good place for me to retire and take some of my skills. That wasn’t a great place to be for me.
I met my partner and the two of us decided we wanted to start a family. There are a lot of financial realities that got learned over the course of this year between the two of us. In July of this year I started to really feel like I was tiring myself out figuring out how we were going to do it. We can’t even buy a house, so how are we going to buy land? I’m 43 years old, my energy is running out. I got this idea in my head when I was 33. I don’t have it in me to start a farm knowing how much energy I need to get through that first 5 years… it really takes 5 years to decide whether or not you want to do it and whether or not you can.
Age. Time. Reality.
We live on the south coast of Massachusetts - land/real estate is priced in millions. You have to be a millionaire to afford to buy land, and most land here is waterfront property.
There are a lot of things going on in our lives and we are leaning really hard into being grateful for what we do have. Leaning into wanting what we have rather than suffering in desire.
When I started the conversation about it with my boss over the summer at the farm, I think the way I started the conversation is that desire is the root of all suffering. I am exhausting myself with desire. I need to want what I have.
WHAT IS IT ABOUT FARM OWNERSHIP THAT YOU DESIRED? THAT YOU FEEL YOU CAN’T GET AS A FARM WORKER?
Part of it I believe has to do a little bit to do with exploitative internships -not just in farming work. Bosses to whom I have been attracted to in my life have been stick and carrot kinds of bosses: You can have what I have if you give me everything you have. Someday you can have what I have, if you give me everything you have. You can be the boss. You can have the freedom and independence of not having to pay rent or worry about losing it. That is just not true in most cases. Being able to plan years ahead like a good farmer has to in terms of crop rotation is a luxury.
“It’s tough because the owners struggle, and they can’t pay people enough. I’ve heard one farmer telling another farmer, “You know, our workers don’t understand that we haven’t even gotten paid yet”. There is actual reality in that, but some rationalize it even further and go over the line of exploitation.”
WHAT KEEPS YOU COMING BACK?
The meaning. There is meaning in it. I’m genuinely concerned about the food supply that is going to be there for my son who is 18 months.
I grew up in New England. I was always uncomfortable about it. The whole country has a history…New England has a history. I came back to New England by accident. I was on my way to Colorado. I ended up staying here - I fell in love, had a baby, all of that. I was talking to my boss who is very passionate about rematriating crops. When he told me about that, absolutely everything told me I was precisely where I was supposed to be. I have never felt comfortable living in New England. Everything is named after someone who was murdered. It’s psychotic. I am a privileged white person and I’m not trying to appropriate anyone’s history, I just have respect for it. When the farm owner told me he grows crops and seeds so we can bring back some of the stuff that was taken, I was thinking maybe this is how we heal the ground. The ground where the battles happened. Maybe the plants are helping us to heal. I like the fact that because I work for this farm, in this place, I get to help do that.
CAN YOU TELL ME QUALITIES OF A DREAM FARM, NOT LEADING TO OWNERSHIP, THAT YOU WOULD WANT TO WORK ON?
I feel really privileged to work for other people who have access to land; I no longer feel I have failed because I don’t have my own land. I am part of something that is actually probably better than anything I would have done. It’s not something I can tell someone like these are the steps to get to where I am right now. I just got really lucky, it’s happening around me. At the farm I work for now, the two employees they have right now - myself and another woman-are going to be kept in the folds to the best of their ability. They don’t plan to hire anyone else. As they figure out the business, they are going to get to a part where it’s the 4 of us working toward a particular principle. The seed nonprofit has a lot of spiritual value to it. It’s not just a capitalist endeavor to grow vegetables and sell them at market to make profit. We are being brought in and respected and given some managerial tasks in the greater organism of the farm. So it’s small and not a typical situation. The couple I work for now isn’t trying to get really really rich. The family farms I've worked for before, their ultimate goal was to take care of themselves and bank money for their kids. These guys are more along the lines of having enough and feeling fulfilled and rich in other ways.
I’ve found a place that values the work that we do more than the profit.
They have been using the word intentionality a lot. They want their business to function with intentionality and they want to farm with intentionality and they want to manage people with intentionality. I’m incredibly fortunate to be with two people who really want to be as good as they can be and they also understand that they can never be big.
They told me they asked themselves this year, ‘why did we fail at this market farm model? This model that we look at our friends and they are really successful at it. Because we never wanted it.” They kind of forgot, it’s such the norm.
It’s still a capitalist endeavor that can be insidiously disguised as a great thing. It gets young people. I was a middle aged woman making a career change kind of thing - idealists, you know?
WHAT ARE SOME ISSUES FOR FARMERS WORKING ON FARMS NOT THEIR OWN - ONES THAT YOU’VE WITNESSED OR EXPERIENCED?
It’s tough because the owners struggle, and they can’t pay people enough. I’ve heard one farmer telling another farmer, “You know, our workers don’t understand that we haven’t even gotten paid yet”. There is actual reality in that, but some rationalize it even further and go over the line of exploitation.
I worked for a dairy farm. I was a cheese monger. Very fancy label. It was owned by people who were independently wealthy from careers only sort of in food. She was sort of in food, he was an architect. Her attitude was basically that I should be happy that she let me work for her. I’ll pay you $25k a year, there is no health insurance, that is all I can give you.
Absolute millionaire.
I had to go up there one time and talk to her about work stuff and she sat there signing her own book. She had this huge pile of her own book and she just sat there signing it. I felt very unseen. That is kind of typical. There are a lot of really wealthy people who get into the food business who have never worked, have never been a worker, don’t know how to treat workers and don’t see anything wrong with the turnover.
Then there are other people who just don't have enough money to pay people. I have worked with people who are dishonest about that - make promises and say you are going to get stuff you are never going to get. They just get work out of you. Internships where you get a place to live and your quality of life can vary. I had access to the shower and laundry in the house and access to some running water, but
I lived in what was essentially a toolshed. I have heard stories of people going to the truck stop to shower and they live in their car. People are trying to get to a place eventually and you have to work your way through these jobs that take so much more than they give.
Between you and me, I think that the farm that I interned with - the owner said only 25% of people who intern actually become farmers. He made it seem like only that percent have what it takes to be a farmer. At the beginning of that internship I would have appreciated being told that in all honestly the people who really make it fit two criteria:
They come from upper middle class wealthy families who are willing to support them, give them money or they have access to land or something like that. Some support because their family has money
They are in a committed functional relationship with a partner farmer.
Those are the people who I have seen farming - they fit both criteria. One or both of them come from money. I wish I had been told that at the beginning of my internship. I don’t have those things, I didn't have those things. My plan was to be a single woman working ½ acre with a market and to build up from there with what money I had. I started with a box of seeds, and someone else’s land and name.
DO YOU CALL YOURSELF A FARMER? WHY OR WHY NOT.
I call myself a farmer. My partner and I were recently applying for a car loan. On it, it says he’s a roofer and I’m a farmer. I like that. I told my boss that and she was like “Yeah!” The people I work for now call me a farmer and think that I should be proud and call myself a farmer.
At another farm I worked at, my boss was talking to her younger daughter and she referred to us as farmers and it felt really good. All of us were working with her and doing the same job. It actually felt respectful from her.
The way it was used in my internship and the way some people use it is like people who do THIS work get to be called farmers, and the people who do THIS work are called field workers.
It makes people compete with each other. It has more to do with manipulating people to get the most work out of people as possible or manipulating the interns act in a managerial fashion or to just organize who is in charge and who is not.
Sometimes I think it's functional organization is the way some people view it, that you need to organize in order to manage people. It depends on how you use it. If you have genuine respect for workers you can call them farmers and it doesn’t make you afraid that you can’t manage them anymore. It has to do with how much confidence you have in your managerial skills.
Maybe anyone who is farming is a farmer.
The farm I worked on where the boss called us all farmers, it was still very clear who was in charge. None of us felt like we were all of a sudden in charge because she called us farmers.
WHAT KIND OF SUPPORT WOULD BE HELPFUL FOR PEOPLE WORKING ON FARMS NOT THEIR OWN?
I read a story on your website about a woman who had to tell her boss that if she couldn’t change her tampon she was going to get a UTI. I am from a different generation and I don’t think I could ever say that.
Advocacy training for people like me who can’t say that. People who are good at setting boundaries or saying those things, maybe training or coaching people who aren’t good at advocating for ourselves. Putting people who are good at advocating for themselves in touch with people who aren't. Because until we have a union…we are many generations away from being recognized and having an infrastructure that is real and seen. We have to take care of each other.
ANYTHING ELSE YOU'D LIKE TO SHARE ABOUT YOURSELF & YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH FARMING? WHAT KEEPS YOU UP AT NIGHT?
I certainly worry about other people who do still want their own land. I still want it.
Land access seems to be getting even harder. There is still some hope. My boss that I work for currently is taking some off farm work and part of her job is going to be connecting people who don't have a succession plan with people who need a farm. There is work being done.
Land access. So many people in this area in Rhode Island are selling their family farms to developers who are turning them into golf courses. I should say, the people I work for lease their land, they don’t own it. They are fortunate to have an old New England family who have had this land in their family for generations. They want it farmed. They have a long term lease, they are safe. They feel safe. They have a good relationship with the current generation in charge and are developing a good relationship with the generation that will be taking over, as well.
WHAT IS YOUR OPINION/TAKE ON THE FARMER LUNCH? (DO YOU TAKE LUNCH, DO YOU SKIP LUNCH, DO YOU ENJOY TAKING LUNCH WITH YOUR CREW - FOR COMMUNITY BUILDING, IS THERE PRESSURE TO BE SOCIAL....)
Lunch was a thing that my bosses had to figure out how to manage on the farm. The generation gap between my coworker and myself is that she has always been paid for lunch for any job she’s ever had and I've never been paid for lunch neither had my bosses.
They asked us what we wanted. I would rather work through lunch and leave a half and hour early, I like having the option. I do once in a while like having a not mandatory but strongly encouraged social lunch, it is really good. I do realize if I have a social lunch with people on the farm then my mind stays on the farm the entire day and I have a better day rather than when I call my partner at lunch and we talk about life stuff.
My bosses have offered us the option of coming into the house and having lunch with them, which I do sometimes. Sometimes I skip lunch and leave early. I like having options.
Being paid for lunch is interesting. I have never been paid for lunch at any jobs I've ever had. I’ve had a lot of jobs.
CAN YOU SHARE A BIT ABOUT WHAT IT WAS LIKE FARM WORKING WHILE PREGNANT?
I worked for two farms at the same time while I was pregnant. The difference between how I was treated between the two farms - one farm where I still work - the owner said, I’ve been pregnant while farming and I know I couldn’t lift certain things, so I’m going to help you not do the things you can’t do. On the other farm I worked on, the owner said, I did all the things when I was pregnant and I expect you to do the same. I felt pressured and did lift things I shouldn't have lifted and did things I shouldn't have done.
I’m old so they induced me at 39 weeks. It was a complicated pregnancy so I had to keep going down in hours. I worked up until 38 weeks packing orders.
DID YOU EVER FEEL LIKE YOU HAD TO QUIT FARMING OR LEAVE YOUR JOB WHILE YOU WERE PREGNANT?
When I got my full time job at this farm, I think they had plans for me. I started working for them in July or August and I found out I was pregnant in October. I definitely think I disappointed them - they had more of an idea of what I couldn't do and how they couldn’t rely on me than I did. They didn’t fire me, absolutely not and they've had pregnant people and are supportive of pregnant people working. They weren’t going to put me on the tractor anymore and they weren't going to give me managerial duties. They were disappointed, which was fine. I completely understand.
They didn’t know I was trying to get pregnant because I wasn't talking with anyone about it. I think it surprised her when I told her.
No one made me feel like I had to stop working altogether. And no, I don't have healthcare through my farm.
FROM ONE FARM WORKER IN THEIR 40’s to ANOTHER, CAN YOU SHARE A BIT ABOUT THAT EXPERIENCE? WHAT ARE CONSIDERATIONS WE NEED TO MAKE AS WE AGE IN THIS FIELD?
I certainly don’t do it 96 hours a week anymore. I would like to get up to 20 hours next year. I’m in that transitional period, my kid is going to be in school. We are learning where to put him and how I work with a baby. I think I can do 40 hours, I was up working 40 hours/ week up into my 3rd trimester. But you gotta take care of your body, you gotta do the yoga and drink water. And sleep. You really have to sleep and I think maybe not work if you can’t. I never call out of work but I did call out for the first time and my bosses were supportive of it. The work needs to get done, but please don’t think we need you trapped into an 8 hour day or 40 hour week. If you really need to take care of your body, please tell us and we will re-prioritize .We will do what we need to do altogether while you’re here and then you can go home.
The short of it is being way more honest with my bosses about where my body is at and working for people who are also in their 40s. Part of their intentionality is that they will ask everyone, how does everyone feel about hoeing for another two hours or do we need to switch it up? Where is your body at? Do you want to hand weed right now or keep moving the push hoe? That’s really important, switching up your body positions.
Eating. I had to start eating more during the day. Taking the breaks and doing the stuff to keep my body going rather than what I learned, you get somewhere by showing people that you don’t need food and you don’t need sleep and you don’t need anything, you can keep going without needing anything.
Take the time to pee. It’s so hard. That’s a big thing at the markets too - there’s the whole retail end of farming, too. There is a whole group of people in New York City and other cities whose entire job is to meet the farmers at the market and sell their stuff for them as if they are family. That was me for a long time.
It comes back to advocating for ourselves and being able to connect with other farmers who can help us to be better at that.