The Story of Caroline's Corner: A Theological Response

The Story of “Caroline's Corner”

This is a very small story.

It is a story of my family as we work together to build a stronger cohesive family.

We are “Caroline's Corner,” and we are made up of 8 team members: five children, two parents and an uncle. We have been quite at home at the Orleans Farmers' Market since 2008.

It started when I held my youngest child at our Cape Cod Hospital on a cold wintry day. An idea came to me, that I wanted to spend more time with my own children. One of the main reason is because I used to waste my time on other projects. Besides working as a general dentist, I used to spend my time and energy on service to God and my religion. I gave my time and money to the services of the Church, and I even served one time as a board member at the Prairie Bible Institute in Three Hills, Alberta, Canada. I dreamed of becoming a theologian, unlocking the secrets of theology and translate my own Bible in a way that might impact my own Asian community. Then I suffered a falling out with this fundamentalist bible college. This Evangelical culture is very business-like and greedy. It does not care about people or this world since they have another one coming. This bible college president was very authoritarian. By the time I figured this out, I had spent lots of my own money travelling to Three Hills, and donated a significant amount of my cash. When I finally came to terms with this, it is as if I had stolen time and money from my own family. As I sat there near my wife at the hospital on that cold cold day, I had a great idea. Repenting from my foolishness in my former religious zeal, I needed to focus on my own family, maybe I should do something crazy. Maybe I should join our local farmers' market, and grow some vegetables with my children.

I decided to call this family venture “Caroline's Corner” as Caroline is my 4th child. At the time, we had no clue where this would take us. We were no farmers, and certainly the least qualified. For starters, we do not really have the land to grow anything. We have a mixed-use house with a dental office. Most of the land is covered by a very large parking lot. We did have a tiny garden in the front of the parking lot, and a small number of hens and quails in the backyard. It is close enough to what you today would call “urban farming” or “Backyard Homestead.” We were not prepared at all. Worst of all, I did not even know where the farmers' market was. So, you can see that is a huge problem. But I was so determined, so I found a way. First, I had to recruited my kids. At that time, my kids were: Ashley, 10 years old, Sean, 9 years old, Christian, 6 years old, and two young girls, Caroline at 2 and Hannah was just born.

I first enticed them by showing them the money! I told them we are going to make big bucks!!(lol). Bob my friend offered to rota-till more land as we got rid of our lawn. My wife Lillian became my adviser, and as a true liberal, she had been an avid collector of organic seed catalogs and seeds. We had the children put down their own money to make raised beds, and shortly three 4' x 8' raised beds were made, and we had our start!

The first day of our market was chaotic. Our small sign got blown over by the wind. We did not know anyone. I had this very uneasy feeling that I was in the wrong place, and perhaps I should not have come at all. We have only mints and garlic chives to sell, and with no takers! In the following week, we doubled our efforts with a few dozen eggs, and added quail eggs. So the Caroline's Corner came to be. I had to make a sturdier farm stand; one that required a bit of work to put together (with the help of all three kids), and added a good size chalk board. Caroline would occasionally join us with our little baby Hannah. I had posted Caroline's little black and white picture on the sign. From then on, it seemed like every thing was going well. We were dreaming of making lots of money! (another laugh). As you know, it turns out this thing does not make George Washington. The income when you tallied it up pays meagerly for our efforts. But friends of God, this is not about money. It is about my family and how I would rather spend my time with them then doing anything else. That year, we were so ill-prepared, but we managed to have sold our little amount of organic vegetables: potatoes, summer squash, tomatoes, garlic, interlaced with my wife's cut flowers.

Each year, this little 'Caroline's Corner' grows a bit bigger, like my kids. Our front lawn had been taken over by a large patch of strawberries. One year. someone gave me some 'Hungarian Ox Hearts' tomatoes plants. So I planted them, which they grew and produced a large amount of tomatoes. My wife later deciphered them as 'Early Girl' because their sizes were about tennis balls, not the softball. My late organic farmer fellow Julie Winslow helped to till more land, and we planted even more garlic. By this time, we had already grown Russian Red, German White, FireBall, Hungarian Purple, and most all, our famous Chinese Pink. I pride myself in bringing to the market during late May, or early Summer, the ½ -¼ pound size of Chinese Pink. No one grew those and we were able to supply them. On the fourth of July, we sold 'Patriotic Potatoes.' The idea was that we were to pull our potatoes in early July, in three colors (Pontiac Red, All-blue potatoes, and Yukon Gold or Russet). They were neatly bundled in a 1 pound bag and sold for 5 dollars (expensive, folks!). They are small, but very delicious, and since no one wants to sell their potatoes at such a suicidal way, we did. The customers responded by saying, “Thank you.” During the tainted egg scare of summer 2010, many customers came for the first time to our market, which by then had grown into some 30 vendors and doubled its size. Many customers came to us and thanked us for doing what we did. Our eggs are both spiritual and good, and very safe.

Looking back, I could have sat in that hospital chair, holding my youngest child, and fret about my religion. Instead, I choose my family and my community. It is not I hate my work (quite the contrary, I enjoy being a dentist in a small town), or I need to feel important. It is that we all need to make our world a better place. Farmers' market brings the freshest produce to their customers, and we add to it, our pride and dignity in our local farming. We build a better community, and bring families together at their meal time. As my religion told me to bring forth the word of life, and so it may sustain us in this world. Our little farmers do just that. My religion taught we are all sojourners on this land. For a little time, we tarry and live and pitch our tents on this land. We should treat both the land and the animals with care and dignity. At the end, this small farm stand, Caroline's Corner, does make money, the type of money that stores not only in the bank, but in our hearts and brought my family together. I wish for all farmers out there, to know that your efforts are well worth it, that you have helped and shaped the world we live in. To them I say, “Thank you!”