I’ve mentioned in many (way too many) of my blog posts that
I work on a farm during the summer. One of the reasons I do this (both online
and in conversation with almost anyone) is because it’s usually met with
incredulity. First of all, the central Massachusetts suburb I call home doesn’t
exactly resemble farm country. Second of all, I don’t exactly resemble a
farmer. Just last week, my orgo lab partner laughed in disbelief when I started
to share a story from my days hoeing and growing (note: farmers do not actually
say things like this), and conversation quickly turned into a series
of bad farm puns (note: farmers do actually make bad farm puns quite frequently).
But the other reason I mention my first job so frequently is
because it played a big role in shaping me into the person and young professional I am today, or so I
like to think. I’ve learned a lot from the farm, and since we’re beginning the
descent into the long New England winter ahead of us, I thought I’d throw it
back to summer this week and share a few of the more relevant (and some of the
less relevant) lessons.
The ability to work independently
and in a team. This is one of the most common criteria you’ll find in job
listings, and is an important skill to be learned. At the farm, we almost
always work in groups, and so you have to learn pretty quickly how to
communicate and cooperate with others. Now, the “independent” part involves a
brief backstory. During my first summer on the farm, one of my bosses kept
noticing that someone was picking underripe, green tomatoes. When this happened
again the following summer, she began to wonder if one of the workers was colorblind.
So, one day, she had everyone take a colorblindness test… and that’s how I learned that I am red-green colorblind. Because of my (*gulp*) condition, I had
to find other work during the time that everyone else was picking tomatoes. This
meant that I worked by myself for a good portion of each day, gathering other
vegetables whose ripeness was not color-dependent. On my own, I had to hold
myself accountable to do good work, and in the end I like to think this made me
a better worker. Now, I’m actually happy that I’m red-green colorblind, because
it allowed me to diversify my day and enrich my experience (although, if you
ask anyone who was working that day, I did NOT take the news well at first).
 |
| The sympathy card that two of my coworkers made for me after that fateful day. It did make me feel a little better. |
Your coworkers can
make or break a job experience. The best part about working on the farm, by
far, is the people I work with. I really doubt that anyone can have as much fun
picking vegetables and shucking corn as we do. In almost every career field,
you’ll have coworkers, and getting along with them is a crucial part of
enjoying your work. Having such a great work family (or farm fam as we like to
call it) has made me realize that no matter what job I have, I need to be
surrounded by funny, kind, and (most importantly) fun people.
You may not always
like the work you do, but it needs to be done. One of those “independent
tasks” I was often relegated to after my colorblindness diagnosis was washing
cucumbers and squash. It’s not the most glamorous job, although once or twice I
did get to wear a pretty fashionable red rubber apron. Even though it was
mind-numbingly boring, I did it because I knew that it needed to be done. Any
job will have a squash-washing-esque duty or two, but it’s important to do
these things even if you don’t necessarily like to do them. Someone appreciates
your work, whether it’s the little old lady making cucumber salad or the hipster
twentysomething making ~cucumber salad~. (And if we're being perfectly honest, standing in front of a cool sink in the concrete farm stand is a much better way to spend a a July day than out in a tomato field.)
The value of hard
work. There’s no doubt that working on a farm is a tough job. The days are
long and hot, and the work is draining. But, at the end of the week, that paycheck
– not to mention the daily reaping of the “take-home” veggies baskets – makes
it all worth it. Farm work taught me the importance of the well-earned dollar,
and instilled in me a sense to spend my money on things only as valuable as the
time I spent earning that money.
I learned many more lessons in my summers
spent on tractors and transplanters. But, we’ll stick with the career-oriented
ones to save readers from a long-winded examination of the differences between Swiss
chard and kale. Even if your first job doesn’t seem like anything more than a
way to earn extra cash, you learned a lot more than you think – and you might
even owe your roots (literal roots in my case) some
appreciation.
Until next time,
Sean Boyden
Class of 2017
