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Our Global Local Market

Nature of the City

By Barbara Jo Shipka

May 9^th, 2015

The mound of freshly picked sugar snap peas caught my eye. I asked one of the children behind the table to package up two pounds for me. While she was doing that, I asked a slightly older boy where they were from. He said they have a small farm near Eau Claire, Wisconsin. Though he didn’t look old enough to drive, he was the one who had driven. He and his siblings left home at about 3:00 am in order to get here and get set up by 6:00 am. They would stay overnight and drive back the next night. They were 6, 10, and 16. Then he told me that his parents weren’t with them because they had driven to the market in Madison…a drive that is at least an hour further from Eau Claire. And that they would do this as a routine throughout the summer and into the fall. I thanked them and wished them well.

As I walked away I found myself pondering just how much hard work they had put into those peas that had cost me under $10…plowing, planting, weeding, cultivating, harvesting, packing, driving, selling…. Sadly, I didn’t have my camera that day. Every other time I returned to the market that summer, the booth was being tended by their parents. The kids had gone to Madison.

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