The last day

The last day

It was monday morning, time to pack up and head back for Ohio. This was a very sad parting. We left, wishing that there was some way that we could pay off all of our debt, and do this ourselves. On our way out of town, we went back to Polyface to visit the on farm store.

We spotted Teresa on the way in, putting out a fire about a group of folks who had ordered Joel's books, but not gotten them. They were in the process of renovating the farm store, so the order probably got lost when their lines were down.

Let's see... we bought a chicken, one rabbit, two pounds of ground beef, two pounds of Italian sausage, and a dozen eggs. Vince and I also bought two fun shirts they have available at their store. One says “Support your local lunatic farmer”, and the other says “Everything I want to do is illegal”.

While we were in the store, they were putting together food for their co-op. They have some really hard workers with their interns and staff, trying to get everything right for their customers.

While we were there, we met Joel's mother. She was cross stitching, so I went to the car and showed her my cross stitch. We talked for awhile, and it was good to meet her and get to know her.

We snapped some pictures with Teresa, and when we were headed out, Joel pulled up with someone he was helping with some hay. We took a quick picture, and headed back to Columbus.

Pacing

Sunday morning there was a lot of pacing. Since we didn't know how long their church service was (and he never answered as to appropriate attire), I left in a long skirt, high collared shirt and dress shoes, with Vince in nice pants and a nice shirt. I also packed a sandwich, and KIND bar, and some trail mix in my purse, just in case. Go to www.kindsnacks.com for information on these awesome snack bars! My biggest fear was that they would invite us to lunch back at their house, and I would have to pass on everything. For example:
"Would you like some milk we got from the cow this morning?"

"Oh, well, then how about some freshly baked bread from last night"

"How about some pastured eggs from our chickens?"


Regardless, at 9:15, we were ready. We walked to the lobby at the front of the hotel, and waited outside. Writing this in late fall is VERY funny because it's about 35 degrees outside now. It was HOT. During the day it was getting up to 95 degrees F. I also wasn't sure if this church had air conditioning!

For those of you who are Salatin nerds, I have some information for you. He drives a Subaru. I can't tell you what the model was, but it was a four door. Teresa and Joel picked us up, and if I could read lips from outside a car, I swear I saw Joel say to Teresa “Well, they are real! Here they are!”.

I was so happy to meet both of them, and the first thing I noted about them is that they laugh. A lot. If you read “Everything I want to do is illegal”, this might surprise you. They have been through, and continue to go through, a serious amount of hardship just to bring folks clean food, raised well, that tastes wonderful!

They were courteous, asking us about our trip (Teresa, his wife, gets car sick too). He said that he was really glad to hear me talking. Teresa had, and rightfully so, brought up the idea that I may be a mumbler. He was relieved to know that the person recording the book knew how to speak well.

They had to take a different route to church (their house was about 25 minutes from the hotel), so Teresa directed Joel. We then had a discussion about GPS systems, and he said that he's never used one. He does a lot of traveling to do speeches, especially in the little Subaru, and said he would just prefer the old fashioned way.

This is when our education about the Shenandoah Valley began. The highway we followed was a very old route, followed by Native Americans. Evidently, this valley is very bountiful, with lots of different food sources, so it was well traveled.