If it came down to it, could you feed yourself? I mean, if there were no more grocery stores and you had to grow or gather your own food, raise animals or hunt, could you do it?

I don’t know if I could. I can’t even grow bamboo and that’s supposedly very easy. As far as animals go I shudder to think of what a mess trying to raise them would be, as is evidenced by our latest cat shenanigans. And slaughtering an animal to eat? Forget about it.

When I used to mow the lawn for my father’s animal hospital a horse from a local farm was brought in via truck having cut its leg on a fence. The farmer and his son removed the animal from the back of the horse trailer with a large bandage on a hind leg. Dad removed the bandage and blood shot across the parking lot, at least 10 feet with every pump of the horse’s heart.

Dad quickly set to repairing the damage while I became quite woozy and needed a seat. Still wobbly, I left on my bicycle with the image of that bleeding horse burning a hole through my skull on the sweltering summer day.

I made it halfway home and everything started to go white. I got off my bike and fainted on my grandmother’s front lawn. She rushed out to tend to me.

I am a wuss, or “wooz”, as my mother pronounces it. I would not do well in a slaughter situation. So, I think I would starve. There are only so many blueberries in the world.

This is why I am grateful for farmers.

What is a farmer?

The term farmer usually applies to a person who grows field crops, and/or manages orchards or vineyards, or raises livestock or poultry such as chicken and cows. Their products are usually sold in a market or, in a subsistence economy, consumed by the family or pooled by the community. [source]

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