Farmers, Farmers, Everywhere

If you have been keeping up with the paper, you will notice I recently spent a couple of days at Farmfest, a farming extravaganza located far, far away near Redwood Falls. If ever you doubted that we live in a agricultural state, just drive up Highway 71 - there are cattle farms and horse farms, soybean farms, pig farms, corn farms, and even a strange field of flowers. Now, I have lived in Minnesota all my life -- and granted, much of it has been in the Twin Cities, but even when I lived there I spent quite a lot of time in southern Minnesota visiting relatives. I think I went through 3 towns in the 2 hours it took to get there - Fairmont, Jackson, and Windom, plus one intersection with a gas station, I am not sure if that was a town or not. I was humbled by the number of farms I saw. It maybe doesn't surprise you, many of you probably have farms around here. I watched as the forum tent was filled past capacity by old men in overalls to hear the senate candidates debate each other. I was shocked. I never realized just how much the politicians decisions affect these men's livelihoods. I learned a lot at Farmfest, and not just about the candidates stances on farm issues. My eyes were opened this week to the importance of farming and just how much farmers do for people who aren't even aware of it -- people like me.