The Fartist

I started the Dark Farm series while driving back and forth from Kansas City to Colorado. I have traveled this long road many times because my family lives there, as had I at one point. I had seen the beautifully decaying abandoned farms many times before, sights for bored sore eyes, but never turned around at the next exit. I was so focused on making it thought the long journey that I didn't want to add all that extra time to my trip. This time was different, I was looking for any excuse to escape my destination, so consumed with what I had just left behind in Colorado.  I had just said goodbye to my 99 year old grandmother, who had suffered irreparable damage from a stroke. I knew the next time I saw her would be at her funeral.  I stopped at several rural structures that trip. I thought about my grandmother's trip across Kansas in a covered wagon and how much time that must have taken! I thought about the decline in American agriculture. How so many family farms couldn't make it because of factory farming and big AG companies like Monsanto forcing those farmers to use GMO seeds. I worry about the conditions of our food supply because of corporate farming policies. About the animals who live in cages instead of all these abandoned, unworked farm fields. I think about how many people eating fast food who have never looked into the eyes of a cow, held a chicken, felt the nuzzle of a horse searching for your last apple. I thought and continually think about the organic and urban farming movement. My own front yard garden is an effort to reconnect with my food supply, my neighborhood. Trying to take charge of my own body, to delay the decay.