That's right...keep walking.

Just got home from the farmer's market - sitting down with a nice, stiff mixed drink and going to do a little blogging. Tonight was alright at market, but alas, I must vent - because tonight people drove me nuts.

You see, at farmer's markets, you are trying to sell your food. I know, mind-blowing. But seriously, the pricing varies from vendor to vendor, but the goal is to sell your delicious-home grown, local produce to the people of the area. As farmers, we aren't out to get anyone or rip anyone off - but rather, to sell the food that we (well more Luke) grew. Now with any farmer's market, the customers are going to compare your food to others, and I get that. Not an issue. But some people have a way of throwing in these comments and remarks that just drive me absolutely bonkers.

Lesson 1: yes, prices vary, but you don't need to be rude about it. Case in point: the little old lady on the scooter. While she hasn't visited us in a few weeks, she stopped by every week last year, and the better part of this summer so far. She seems like she will be a sweet old lady, pulling up in her scooter. But every week, it is the same story. She asks us about one item, typically the fruit. Last year it was the blueberries, every single week of August. She says, in a raspy voice, "how much for the blueberries," and I reply (so sweetly and innocently, of course), "$3.00/pint." Her response is so identical each week that it is almost comical, almost. She would take her left hand off the scooter handle, wave at me, scoff, say "too much" and drive away quickly. It takes so much will-power in my body to not yell out to her when she drives up "mam...everything we sell is too much - keep moving." Anyway, I don't do that, every week I just smile and say "$3.00/pint."

To continue lesson 1, I must stay that our food is produced organically (though not certified organic), and this does make prices higher because it is more expensive to produce and more time-intensive. However, the added cost will pay off in the long run because of the decreased health issues in the future (I firmly believe this). Regardless, several people a night will comment on or scoff at our prices, and after awhile, it gets old! Last week, one lady came up and said something along the lines of "Are you kidding me? 75 cents for a cucumber, that is ridiculous." I thought Luke was going to jack her in the face, I had to hold him back! No, I'm kidding, but seriously, when she walked away, he said to me, "I'm so sorry, I'll give it to you for a quarter. I can sell 4 of them and have a whole dollar! Seriously, its like, hello, trying to make a living here." And that is just it - 75 cents for a cucumber isn't that much. We have to sell a lot of them at that price even to get it to add up. I will let you in on a little secret - farmers are not rich. I know, shocking, but true. So it would be awesome if people would just have some understanding for the work that we do and the hours we spend busting our butts in the heat so that they may enjoy a few cucumbers.

Alright, so you may be reading this and thinking, what is this chick complaining about - people have the right to comment on prices. Well, yes, they do, but people also have the right to carry concealed weapons in some states. Just because you have the right, doesn't mean you necessarily should. It really does get old. One lady came up to buy zucchinis, and said "2 for $1.50? You can get them 2 for $1.00 down the road." I responded with, "well, then you just walk on down the road and buy those." She looked at me like I was a bitch, and walked away. I couldn't really believe that I had said it, and Luke was like "did you really just say what I think you said?" I apologized, but he didn't care, he said that if he had more balls he would respond like that to people as well. It wasn't necessarily the nicest thing to say, but it did feel good.

The next part you need a little background information on, and that is, farmers really only want to sell high-quality food. Trust me, Luke brings in piles of vegetables for me to use that don't meet the quality requirements, so I get bunches of deformed carrots, mangled beets, green potatoes, mushy strawberries. However, no matter how cautious you are, sometimes, an imperfect fruit or vegetable may sneak through. Last year, in September, we were selling our watermelons. We had eaten several of them, and so had my parents - they were all delicious. At the farmer's market, we cut one in half so people could see how deliciously ripe that they were. We sold a lot of watermelons. Well, one couple came marching up with a watermelon that we had sold them, and it was white and pink on the inside, not ripe at all. This was an honest mistake - typically if some of the patch are ripe, then they all are. Well, this couple was irate and they weren't afraid to show it. It was like they thought that we had purposely only cut the one ripe watermelon in half and that we had x-ray vision to see into the other un-ripe watermelons, know they weren't ripe, and then intentionally rip people off. Even after we gave them a refund, they were not satisfied. They had to be inconvenienced to drive back down there, return the watermelon, and waste their time (which they didn't seem to notice that they themselves were doing as they were ripping us a new one). So, lesson 2 - forgive the farmers if your produce might not be perfect - trust me, the mistake was not intentional.

Anyway, I just needed to blog about this because my frustration was mounting every time people complained or gave me a snarky comment. Now that I have it off my chest, I can start fresh next week, put on my smile, and say, "Yes, they are 75 cents each, but I promise you, they are worth it."