(Here is a photo of Nathaniel hand mowing the orchard. Nothing like crisp, arrow straight stripes to help showcase the fall apple harvest. But there is plenty of acreage so he had plenty of time to consider more efficient ways to mow. The next day he was checking price tags on toddler sized tractors.)
One of the attractions to farming is the working / thinking / improving cycle. Its always fun to "do" but even more satisfying to "do better".
I like to design and build clever solutions but some days OCD consumes me and I get stuck thinking about improvements and never actually get to improving.
For example, a tomato trellis. We have never lost a tomato plant due to trellis failure.
Yet I am still consumed with the idea of improving our trellis design. Forget practicality; I want to design a trellis so innovative that it will be featured in engineering journals. I realized I had gone too far only when I found myself studying mathematical equations for catenaries. Stop!
So as we begin to review our successes and failures and plan for next year, let's keep Nathaniel's lesson in mind. Do, then do better, and stay within reasonable limits.
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