Chance Meeting with Arnold

 …people you wished you’d met on the road...

 

Lost to the dustbin of my memory is exactly why or when, other than Arnold Schwartzenegger was governor. Serving as the curriculum leader in a Sacramento area school district, and as an obligatory member of the Association of California School Administrators (ACSA), I found myself enrolled in a conference of educators focused on something-er-other and arranged for the ballroom of a hotel across from the state capitol. During a much needed afternoon break where perhaps 500 of us were milling about clutching store-bought cookies and sipping Coca Colas, the lights in the hall flashed on and off, on and off. The group quieted, someone took the mic and said, “Supes and Assistants, the governor wants a photo op with about eight of you.” 

         

I shrunk to the back of the venue, but my name tag label “Assistant Superintendent Curriculum and Instruction” betrayed me. Tapped on the shoulder, someone herded me and seven others into an adjacent room where we were instructed to line up. “The Governor wants to see you.”

         

A near-silent buzz coursed through the assembly of colleagues that I’d never met. Seventh in the line of eight, I straightened the tie I was wearing, a black something decorated with images of Crayola crayons. Very elementary school.

         

Mr. Schwartzenegger – a bit shorter than I’d imaged – entered with an aide, a broad smile and an outstretched hand. This should only take a few minutes, I thought. But it didn’t. To the superintendents this would be their less-than-fifteen minutes of fame. Each one grasped the governor’s hand and would not let go until they’d offered more-than-two-cents-worth on some issue or topic I was sure the governor either didn’t particularly care about or about which he’d already made up his mind. As he inched closer, I realized his smile was pasted on, the handshakes perfunctory and that this was simply one of the duties an elected person had to perform if they wanted to stay an elected person. It seemed artificial, fake. I decided not to play the lobbying game.

 

Months, maybe a year, prior, the governor had been riding his glitzy ‘Wide Glide’ motorcycle along the Pacific Coast Highway though Pacific Palisades sans the required helmet. 

The city cop pulled him over and issued the required citation. Rumor has it that Arnie thanked the officer for his service.

 

My turn came up and as Arnold Schwartzenegger grasped my hand, I looked him in the eye and quietly – so as not to embarrass him – said, “Jeez, governor. A Harley?”

         

His hand immediately pulled away and I felt a firm Austrian index finger pointedly poking my chest four or five times. “I bet you drives zee Bee Em Dawbue!” he said with a grin. An honest grin. 

 

I nodded as he clapped my shoulder. Making a different kind of eye contact, together we laughed and he said, “You be safe, now.”

 

With a wink he was gone to whomever was next and I was left with the impression that, in that moment, Arnold Schwartzenneger was anything but fake. 

I’ve always wished we could have done the Pacific Coast Highway together.

 

© 2025

Church of the Open Road Press

SOME BOOK MAGIC

 In praise of a good reference book…

…and a little kismet

 

For reasons I cannot recall, about a half century ago, I picked up a copy of Erwin Gudde’s California Place Names, the hardbound edition, at the used bookstore on Broadway in Chico…  

…Maybe because new it was listed at $15.95 but this one was marked down to $13.50… 

I’d probably picked it off the shelf and looked up Chico [page 62]… 

…then Paradise [page 238], then Butte Creek [page 44] and learning useful trivia about the origins of the names of the places near which I’d grown up.

 

The wisdom of that purchase was confirmed a few years later when I served as a Fourth Grade teacher in Durham [page 96]…

…and kept it on hand in the back of my classroom. At the conclusion of my reading Scott O’Dell’s classic Island of the Blue Dolphins to the class, one of my students asked if the island was real and what was it really called. Pulling Place Names from the back counter, the kids learned about San Nicolas Island… 

 

…and the Santa Barbara islands and a bunch of other one-thing-led-to-another- type stuff found in such a volume. After lunch recess, we always engaged in ten-minutes of silent reading. A little boy pulled the reference book from the back counter. He wanted to find out about the town where his grandparents lived. The next day another one picked it up.

 

Two or three years into my tenure as a fourth grade teacher, someone donated an aquarium to the class. (There’s a lesson here.) I gladly accepted it, and one Friday afternoon, set it up and filled it with water thinking that over the weekend the water would warm enough to be suitable for a goldfish or a guppy. Monday, I discovered not an aquarium filled with warm water, but a countertop backed with water-logged books. Including Place Names… 

…Tossing out some, having to pay for others, I kept Gudde’s volume knowing it was still serviceable once all the pages dried out. Yet, over the intervening fifty years, I’ve felt a pang of disappointment every time I leave through its crackly pages. So much so that I was always on the lookout for a replacement. I even purchased the 40^th Anniversary edition (2004) in paper, but that fell short of relieving my angst.

 

During those Durham days, I was a regular attendee of the Bidwell [John Bidwell, page 28 (entry) and 376 (glossary)] Presbyterian Church in Chico. I even served on their Session ~ the elective body that oversees policy for the congregation. The session was comprised of long-time members, many upstanding members of the Chico community: doctors, lawyers, university types, educators. Not sure how I qualified.

 

John Nopel, decades my senior, was one of ‘em. He and his wife always sat a few pews in front of me and the family I’d married into during my first attempt at matrimony. In reviewing his lovingly prepared obituary, it became clear that Mr. Nopel garnered many claims to fame beyond being an elder in the Presbyterian Church. A life-long member of Scouting, in 1934, he worked on the construction crew building Camp Lassen, the Boy Scout Camp where 54 years later, I wed [See Eden Indeed: Tales, Truths and Fabrications of a Small Town Boy pages 210-15]. As a school principal, Mr. Nopel opened Chico’s Hooker Oak School in 1948 and later served as an associate superintendent for the school district before moving to the county office. Career coincidence found me a member of Chico’s Phi Delta Kappa educational fraternity with him, later employed opening two new schools (elsewhere) myself. But, perhaps, most significant, he was the heartbeat of the Butte County Historical Society maintaining files and photos of the earliest years of my old stompin’ grounds. His library of historic texts and references must have been exhaustive.

 

 

Why might I think this? A couple of weeks back, I engaged in another of those searches for a copy of my long-damaged book. To my surprise, AbeBooks so called ‘sellers of books, fine art and collectables’ had one listed. In excellent condition. Priced at  thirty-five bucks! (AbeBooks, it turns out, serves as a means for individuals to market their wares to an online audience. Note: I normally avoid shopping for books online.) Confirmation of my purchase came with a bit of information about the seller. Enough to tell me to whom this copy might have once belonged. The Chico address rang a bell.

 

The book arrived. The cover, sheathed in plastic perfect. The pages pristine. Side-by-side, it was an exact match for my waterlogged copy. I can’t say my throat didn’t constrict a bit.

 

That evening, I settled into a favorite chair with a thimbleful of favored scotch and began to thumb through. All the listings I’d referenced before were there as, of course, were entries about the new places I’ve explored…

 

…and before I knew it, an hour-and-a-half and fifty years magically dissolved.

 

Mr. John Nopel (1914 – 2006): Perhaps your greatest calling was that of teacher. Know that even now in 2025, you’re still in the business.

 

© 2025

Church of the Open Road Press

MR. MET AND MR. MILLER

A tribute to teachers

Last February, while visiting New York, I slipped into a souvenir shop and picked up a Mets t-shirt off the sale table.  The other day, I was wearing it on the trail out behind our house when an on-coming hiker said, “Hey, we beat you guys last night.”

I looked down at the logo.  “I’m not… I’m… Well, I used to be…”

In 1960s Chico, everyone was either a Giants fan or a Dodgers fan.  I didn’t want to be an everybody, so when, in 1962, New York was granted an expansion franchise, I decided I’d pull for the new New York Metropolitans. Their uniforms were old school and even recalled the two teams that had departed five years before: blue coming from the old Brooklyn Dodgers and orange from the Giants.  

Fast forward seven years and I’m a senior in high school laboring all the while with cellar dwelling Mets.  Only once in their entire existence had they not finished last in National League East.  Occasionally, I’d wear a blue and orange sweater my mother had knitted – one with the word “Mets” scripted on the front and back, only backwards on the back so I could see it when I backed up to a mirror.  I suspect that my choice of this attire had much to do with my lack of dating prowess as a teen.

During that senior year, a young Mr. Ken Miller, was my Civics teacher (they taught Civics back then – and they still do, Frank Zappa).  Mr. Miller had, at one time, roomed with Tug McGraw.  Country heart-throb Tim, Tug’s son, probably hadn’t been born yet when Ken and Tug played for the Buffalo Bisons, the Mets’ AAA affiliate.  (Or maybe it was the Binghamton Mets in AA.) Tug, with his tick-tock wind-up would become a go-to reliever with a team former manager Casey Stengel called “Amazing.” 

Ken would go on to teach high school civics.

In late September, the Mets were locked in a grueling – and, yes, Amazing! – divisional race with their rivals the Chicago Cubs who had been in first place for 156 games.  With a week left to go, the Mets were a few games out of first but within striking distance and the Cubs’ gas tank was near empty.  That week, each day before first period, I snuck into Mr. Miller’s classroom and chalked a headline onto the board.  The next morning, whatever comment I written the day before would be dutifully erased by the night custodian.  The last Friday before the end of the season, I pulled on my sweater, snuck into the room and wrote: “Mets Cop 1^st from Fading Cubs!” Mr. Miller looked from his desk – surprising me – and said, “Well, if it isn’t Mr. Met.”  Then he walked over to the board and scribbled the word “save” next to my headline. 

It was a good long time before that corner of the chalk board was erased.  Certainly, it was up there the night Tug McGraw and a bunch of Ken Miller’s former pals whooped it up on the pitcher’s mount at Shea after a decisive and historic game 5.  

I shipped the sweater off to the Mets organization because I knew I didn’t need it any longer, though I didn’t tell Mom. Tug McGraw went on to pitch for the Phillies and Ken, I think, moved from the classroom into administration.  

Since my encounter on the trail, I’ve thought about the ’69 Mets some, but I’ve thought a lot more about Ken Miller and the countless other Chico teachers who, in spite of my geekiness, helped me to become.

And as my teacher buddies enter the 2019-20 school year, I, again, offer my admiration and encouragement to the many who, like Ken Miller, will help our young people to become.

© 2019

Church of the Open Road Press

TEACHING IN VIOLENT TIMES

I heard you in my head yesterday.

I taught a lesson yesterday during a lockdown.

I taught in a whisper.

I heard your voice say,

"If we don't teach today, they win."

This morning, Terri, a woman who once taught at a school where I served as the site principal posted the above on my page on a popular social media site.  I was touched deeply by her remembrance. 

(For the record: I’m retired, and a different district employs Terri now.  And “Terri” is her real name.)

September 11, 2001 wasn’t all that long ago.  I recall driving to school, listening to NPR’s Morning Edition and wondering what the hell was going on.  Once at school, I tuned a TV in to discover that hell was indeed going on that day.

At a hastily called staff meeting as we discussed how to address this great unknown with our students, one teacher asked, “Shouldn’t we just send the kids home today?  What could we possibly teach them?” to which I replied: “If we don’t teach today, they win.”

That was a damned fine statement I made, but honestly, it must be the case that I heard it somewhere else that morning.  I don’t think on my feet all that well.

I didn’t glance at my Facebook page this morning until after I’d read the local (Santa Rosa) paper.  A page five story reported that in the midst of an investigation a Sacramento County stolen vehicle task force was fired upon.  An assailant armed with a high-powered weapon injured to CHP officers and fatally wounded a deputy.   A witness reported, “It sounded like a machine gun.  It just kept going and going.”

When I read Terri’s post on my page, I connected some dots concluding that her school was locked down as this incident played out in the neighborhood. 

All the while, she taught.

Walloped by a few moments of introspection, I got to thinking: Maybe I’d lied on that morning of September 11^th.  Maybe they are winning anyway. 

A hit and run on a local highway left a bicyclist dead.  A driver in a white pickup shoots into the passenger compartment of a car he’s passing on 101 then disappears.  A homeless Santa Rosan, know for his writing and story telling bleeds to death on a sidewalk after being knifed by someone unknown. Daily we read about or witness violent demonstrations or mass shootings or assaults on the police or assaults by police somewhere in the country. 

Yep, maybe they are winning.

The moment passes.  I find myself remembering visits to classrooms.  In pretty much all of the classrooms, students are engaged in learning – rich, deep and challenging.  But in a lot of classrooms, more is going on.  Kids’ unique needs are embraced, their differences celebrated, their fears quelled, they feel safe; their smiles glowing, their hearts in tune with the teacher who’s heart is in tune with her students.  Education steeped in nurture.  Good things are happening. 

Such things happen in classrooms across America every day.

Yesterday, I know, they were happening in Terri’s room.

And because of that, I know the bad guys aren’t going to win.

© 2017

Church of the Open Road Press

THIS PLACE I KNOW: a book recommendation

Georgia Heard, Candlewick Press: 2002, 2006, $17.

One of the darkest things a school principal must confront is the death of a student or the death of a student’s parent.  You can’t shake the fact that such tragedies put all that we do on a daily basis into a painful perspective.  Our education, our training – and almost always our words – fail us.

Shortly after the events of September 11^th, 2001, Georgia Heard collected a dozen and a half children’s poems and worked with a similar number of children’s book illustrators to create a delightfully moving little collection called This Place I Know.  Her intent was to provide words of comfort to the children who lost so much on that tragic day.

I somehow stumbled across the book and purchased a personal copy.  Shortly thereafter, I received a call through my superintendent that the father of one of my students needed to see him for an important matter.  Could it wait until recess?  No.  It seems his mother was on a cruise ship vacation and, with handbag or purse missing, her body was found at the foot of a flight of stairs.  Dad needed to deliver the news.  He did so in the parking lot about fifty feet from my office door.  The boy crumpled as I watched helplessly.

That evening, I went home and reread my favorite poem from This Place I Know.  Then I read them all.  Within the week, I dropped by the student’s house and gave him the book.

Over the course of several years, I found myself giving copies to many kids, and in the case of students taken from us, to many classroom libraries.

I’ve been out of the business for six years now, but the import of that tiny volume lingers.

A couple of weeks ago, the headline in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat screamed: “Two children die after truck plunges into river.”  The elder child had just started second grade at a small, coastal school housing about 100 students K through 8. It's nearby.

I thought of the family, the teacher and the school principal and sought my volume of This Place I Know.  I needed to pass it forward. 

© 2016

Church of the Open Road Press

A VISIT TO THE WHITMAN MISSION AND…

 

…the lies I told my students

Early in my teaching career, I came up with the idea of using read-aloud time with students to prepare them for whatever the next social studies unit of instruction might be about.  So, while I was teaching California geography to my fourth graders, I’d be reading Scott O’Dell’s classic Island of the Blue Dolphins to surreptitiously provide a little background knowledge for the upcoming unit on California Indians.

In preparation for my unit on the westward movement, while teaching about California Indians, I read a compelling novel called Oregon At Last! by a Dutch author named A.Rutgers Van Der Loeff.  It tells the remarkable tale of the seven children of the Sager family.  It seems the family, like so many others during the 1840s, decided to leave Illinois and migrate to the fertile prospects of Oregon’s Willamette Valley.  Tragically along the way, mother died shortly after giving birth, then a few weeks later, father died.  Alone in a foreign and hostile environment, oldest boy, John, led his brothers and sisters through floods, fires, blizzards and threats of bears and wolves to finally arrive at Marcus and Narcissa Whitman’s outpost on the banks of the Walla Walla River. 

The book was a great read, with the savvy reader – me – learning that if I closed the volume about two sentences before the end of each chapter, just before each crisis was resolved, my students would clamor for me to not stop, sometimes even disturbing the class next door with their protestations.  They loved the book and many were in tears at the end when Narcissa Whitman, clutching the eight-week-old infant declares: “Where did you come from?  I cannot believe that I’ve ever seen a child so beautiful as you.”  Or something to that effect.

We used the themes of the book to write our own stories about bravery, perseverance and luck.  All good stuff.  Except…

Long on my list of things to do has been a visit to the grounds of Marcus and Narcissa Whitman’s outpost near the Columbia River.  The story of their care for the Sager children long drove this desire in me. 

In the 1835, prompted by an evangelical movement known as “the Second Great Awakening,” easterners Reverend Samuel Parker and a young Dr. Marcus Whitman traveled to Oregon country to assess the prospects of establishing Presbyterian Missions in order to save the “heathen natives” who’d long settled in the area. 

Parker remained west while, in 1836, Whitman returned with his new bride, Narcissa – one of the history’s first two white women to venture west of the Rockies – and a group of evangelical volunteers along what was soon to become the Oregon Trail.

Painting of Whitman Mission as imagined by William Henry Jackson based on written descriptions.

The mission was established and relations developed between the Whitmans and native Cayuse.  Whitman taught the native population farming and irrigation techniques – and religion – and ultimately built a gristmill, blacksmith shop and a large adobe house.

With the influx of immigrants, the mission of the mission changed from that of civilizing the Indians to providing aid and rest to the newcomers who’d suffered immeasurable privations on their journey west.  Among these were the seven Sager children.

But the kids hadn’t roughed it alone as Van Der Loeff (and later, Disney: recall the film “Seven Alone”) would have us believe.  The practice of the times was that if a parent died, others within the traveling company would pitch in – and if both parents passed, offspring would be divvied up amongst other families and cared for.  Such was the case with John and his siblings.  Tragic, but not quite so compelling a tale.

National Park Service

In 1847, a measles plague swept through this section of the Columbia Plateau.  Dr. Whitman’s medicine appeared only to work on immigrant children.  The children of Cayuse died, sometimes several per day.  Believing that the Whitmans were responsible, the Cayuse determined that in order to save their people, the white people needed to die. 

A monument is erected atop a nearby hill with a sweeping view of the area the Whitmans hoped to tame.  The plaque thereon lists the names of those killed in the assault including John Sager and a brother, both of whom had stayed at the mission.

The story of the short existence of the Whitman Mission provides fascinating insights into our movement west, our penchant for believing our religion is somehow superior, the tragedies that befell both the whites who first ventured onto the Columbia Plateau and the natives they encountered.  Remains of the outpost include only the foundation locations of some of the original buildings, a restored pond that had provided irrigation water, a resurrected orchard, and a pleasant interpretive center. 

National Park Service

After a visit to this spot, one cannot but be moved by the enormity of what events here precipitated. Citizens moving west established the Oregon Trail, which might not have taken its soon-to-be-established route, had it not been for the mission.  Word of the tragedy prompted Washington to deploy personnel to protect citizens moving west.  Treaties were written, signed and ignored.  And many brave and beautiful cultures were ultimately trodden to dust as one people overtook another.

You may find yourself driving away consumed in reflective silence.

o0o

Notes: 

The Whitman Mission is a National Historic Site maintained by the National Park Service.  Details: https://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/cultural_diversity/Whitman_Mission_National_Historic_Site.html

The Park Service has provided an excellent video exploring both the Native American’s and the immigrant’s perspective on the Whitman Mission and the tragic events that unfolded.  It is well worth 25 minutes of your time and may be accessed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFLsOEnKMg0

Related: A fine Oregon Trail Interpretive Center has been established by the Bureau of Land Management in Baker City, Oregon another worthy stop while on the Open Road.  Details: http://www.blm.gov/or/oregontrail/#

For one man’s contemporary view of the Oregon Trail, check out my little review of this recent book, in which, in the end, the author pays his respects to Mrs. Whitman: http://thechurchoftheopenroad.blogspot.com/2016/04/suggested-reading-oregon-trail-new.html

© 2016

Church of the Open Road Press

WALKING THE FULL BELLY FARM WITH DR. BENJAMIN BLOOM

I never was too impressed with the term “organic.”  Like “new and improved,” “lite,” “authentic,” “life-time,” “limited,” and now, “gluten free,” the term organic seemed tagged to a product simply as a marketing ploy.  At least that’s the way I saw it.  My spouse would buy organic vegetables and fruits and eggs, paying a little more, but when I went to the store, because of my built in cynicism and the fact at chemicals hadn’t killed me yet, I didn’t.

Recently, we ventured up California’s State Route 16 into the luscious Capay Valley.  It seems the first weekend in spring, or thereabouts, the Full Belly Farm has an open house. Berkeley friends are subscribers to a program called Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) wherein Full Belly offers neighborhood delivery of fresh organic produce to customers in the Bay Area and Sacramento.  We plan a rendezvous with our friends at the farm.

Springtime in the Capay Valley is what God must have had in mind when Eden was created.  Rolling green hills are dotted with blue oaks and mantled in poppies and lupine.  Row upon row of blossoming stone fruit trees - almonds, peaches, plums - provide spring's signature fragrance while, against an azure sky, the sun plays hide-n-seek through puffy, fair weather clouds.

The highway twists through farmlands and pastures and into and out of bergs with populations that can be enumerated with merely two digits.  

I’ve ridden the road many times in all seasons of the year, always wanting to linger longer and dig deeper.  This day, I’d get to.

The Full Belly Farm is roughly 400 acres backing up to Cache Creek.  Salvaged from an aging almond orchard in the ‘80s, its four partner/owners employ 60 people year round.  Almost unheard of in agriculture, this employment model is only one of the enlightened possibilities availed by the philosophy of the ownership group: sustainability.   The walking tour with co-owner Paul explains it all.

We stroll past an apple orchard where Fujis are in blossom. “Other apples do better in this heat,” we are told….

…and a strawberry field.  Paul lifts the deer fence to let the children crawl under.  “Grab yourself a strawberry, but please be careful not to step on the plants”…

…on the way to a seven-acre plot of garlic.

“Small, diversified croplands,” he says.  “We can produce so much more and care for the land so much better.”

A flock of hens is penned by a temporary fence.  Inside the enclosure is a rolling hen house.  The hens scratch at the land by day repairing to the henhouse at night.  At regular intervals the fence and henhouse is moved to a new plot leaving behind the natural fertilizer than chickens produce.

In another area, sheep graze down tall grasses using their natural digestive processes to return nitrogen and other nutrients to the soil.

Beyond the rows of garlic, a field of lettuce varieties grows uniformly.  Seeds are planted between furrows.  When weeds sprout, “we smother them with dirt keeping the non-favored plant from getting sunlight.”

Natural oils are used to discourage some pest insects, but swaths of land with lush growth are reserved as insect havens.  “If you stop and look, you’ll soon see a lot of movement, hear a lot of sound. 

“Too many in agriculture treat honey bees like farm workers – and we shouldn’t treat our farm workers this way.  Traditionally we’d use the bees in the almonds, then put ‘em in a box and ship ‘em to the next job."

Paul points to a section of tousled, knee-high weeds and grasses.  “Here, we don’t have honey bee hives, but honey bees and other pollinators live here because we’ve set up environments in which they thrive.”

Among the mixed tangle of weed-like plants grows a variety with blue flowers.  “Flax,” we are told.  “We are experimenting with growing the plant for its fiber.”

And about that year-round employment?  “Because of how we do things - planting, harvesting and planting again, spring summer and fall, we have to have people here all the time.”  Then he adds: "Bees, too."

As we walk along, I begin to think of Benjamin Bloom (1913-1999) a preeminent educational thinker of the mid-twentieth century.  His taxonomy of learning processes is something we all studied as teachers. 

But finding examples of his theory actually put into practice are elusive.  Alongside farmer Paul, I suddenly realize I am walking alongside a real, live Benjamin Bloom. 

The success of this organic endeavor rests squarely in the farmer knowing how to employ Bloom’s hierarchy of thought.  Here’s what I saw:

Recall (or knowledge): The farmer knows the soil.  He knows the seed, the water, the exposure to sun, the heat, the cold, the seasons.  And the market.

Grasp (or understanding): The farmer understands what crops will be successful in which corner of the property.  He understands the strengths and weaknesses of a plant or variety.

Application: The farmer makes decisions about what goes where in concert with that grasp.

Analysis: The farmer gathers data, which may be as simple as measuring the yield of a particular product on a particular plot.

Synthesis:  The farmer marries what he’s learned about yields with what he’s learned about the natural benefits of sheep grazing and chicken scratching or reserving space for insects or allowing weed cover to mature in order to conserve moisture to enhance the chances for greater results in subsequent efforts.

Judge or conclude:  Experimenting with new combinations of exposure, water retention, micro-climates and poop, the farmer allows less productive practices to slip away to be replaced by those practices he judges to be more successful.

Perfunctory Old Truck Picture

Walking back to the farmhouse, I tell Paul he should be a teacher “…you know, if this farming thing doesn’t work out.”  Clearly there’s educational practice stuff he gets, I’m thinking. 

He chuckles, offering a very modest reply and then says something to this effect: It’s relatively simple to engage in all of those levels of thinking when you’re working with your hands in the soil day by day.  Our livelihood depends on it.  “Schools, I suppose, can’t do this too effectively because of cost, logistics…”

He’s right, of course.  Our students could receive a much more hands on – much better grounded – experience if schools could somehow be more like farms.  They would graduate with a less sterile but far more heightened sense of how things work and how those things work together.

It’d be organic.

o0o

Full Belly Farm is located just on County Road 43, off Highway 16 about a mile and a half north of Guinda.  They are open to the public on select days (see their website) and offer organic produce and fiber through farmer’s markets and their Community Supported Agriculture program.

Internships are available, school field trips are encouraged and there’s a summer camp for kids.

Check out their website for coming events and to learn more: http://fullbellyfarm.com/

© 2015

Church of the Open Road Press