CCFB News» May 2024

Each year, there are certain days that have been identified as important to recognize and reflect upon…to observe. I feel like the observation days on the calendar are getting crowded, but I selected a few recent observation days to add my two cents.

April 22, Earth Day…

I was taught growing up to respect the soil, water, plants, and animals. Caring for these element of the earth is the role of the farmer and in exchange, the farmer relies upon nature to do its “Spring Rebirth” miracle. We trust life miracles to occur every year. Every day is Earth Day on the farm.

April 25, Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work® Day…

This annual event encourages parents to take their children to work with them for a day to help children explore the joys parents find in being part of the workforce. After seeing how much fun parents have at their offices or on worksites for a day, children will be inspired to seek a productive work career. I could be wrong. Kids with parents that work from home call the day a “snow day”.

My daughters and sons are now taxpaying adults. However, when they were youngsters, they had NO interest in coming to my office to watch me push a pencil, attend meetings, and drink coffee (no matter how much I tried to make it sound exciting). They were a bit more willing to go to entertaining Farm Bureau sponsored activities …the giant pumpkin contest, farm tours, member appreciation days, ball games, and especially those out-of-town trips that included hotels with pools.

My father, the Farmer, was ahead of his time when he invented “take your kid to work days” back in the 1960s and 70s. His “take your kid to work” program was practiced on me. In his shadow, I learned the joys and thrills of feeding pigs, cleaning manure of barn, shoveling grain, lugging bales of straw for bedding, and performing other farm chores.

His program worked so well that he created “take your kid to work week” followed by “take your kid to work month”. He allowed my sisters and brothers to celebrate as well.

As a special part of the event, the Farmer provided lunch through this great chef named Mom for meat and potatoes. This became my favorite part of “take your kid to work day”. During the heavy busy season of planting and harvesting, the great chef named Mom would deliver and serve dinner on the tailgate of the pickup out in the farm fields (little-known fact: …the great chef named Mom invented Uber Eats).

This year's Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work® Day event had the theme, "Inspire 2 Aspire," instilling a mindset that children can choose their own future. This theme resonated with me in my youth as I was inspired to not seek to become a pig, sheep, or goat farmer. I was, however, inspired to earn a regular paycheck. Fortunately, I was also inspired to work with farmers during my entire career.

The Farmer’s “Take your Child to work program” taught me the value of hard work, productivity, satisfaction in a job well done, the value of free time, responsibility, lifecycles of plants and animals, and the beauty of our green earth.

May 12, Mother’s Day…

I have some mothers in my life that deserve to be “observed”!

When you see a quality farm operation, you typically find involved, strong women.

My mother has partnered with my father for so many decades for a successful family and farm. Our family would have been lost and the farm ineffective without the strong backbone and kind heart my mother provides.

Farms do not hold the monopoly on strong, effective women.

My mother-in-law, Pat, is not from the farm but has farm values and strength to her core… kind, supportive, independent, generous. As the devoted family matriarch, I am so appreciative of her.

And speaking of strong and devoted women!

My wife is a great mother, partner, and friend. She may not originate from the farm, but she possesses a huge heart for agriculture and is the soul of our Farm Bureau, farm-loving life, and home.

A Happy Mother’s Day shoutout to all of our Farm Bureau family mothers!