A Lesson in Letting Go

Nobody told me that farming — even micro-farming, even the romantic orchard-and-tiny-farmhouse variety — would require me to become a person who checks the weather app fourteen times a day. And yet here we are.

Spring in West Virginia is not a season so much as a negotiation. One morning, I’m having coffee on the porch in a flannel shirt thinking, okay, I get it now, I understand why people do this. Two days later, there's a frost advisory, and I’m Googling whether apple blossoms can survive 28 degrees at 2 a.m. like some kind of anxious new parent. (The answer, for the record, is: it depends, and also, maybe don't look it up at 2 a.m.)

I've learned that a forecast here is less a prediction and more a suggestion, but the orchard doesn't seem to mind. The trees are doing their thing regardless — budding out, blooming, taking their cues from something older and more reliable than my phone screen. I'm trying to take notes.

There is something edifying about weather I can't control. I make my plans, I schedule the thing, and then I adapt. It turns out that's not just a farming lesson, I guess. The next round of rain is moving in sometime around — checks app — now, apparently. Maybe that’s the universe handing you an opportunity to pivot, check your calendar, and schedule your next visit to Storylodge Farm. You’re always welcome, rain or shine.