Meeting Myrna
I first met Myrna and her husband Earl in November of 2020. I left the San Joaquin Valley, headed north, and drove past miles of grape leaves turning red in the November sun to reach the gourd farm - just down the road from a winery that was rebuilding from the most recent fire to burn in Sonoma County. When I arrived at their farm, Early Bird’s Place, Myrna and Earl were boxing up eggplants for the food bank in their garage, where boxes were piled high for neighbors in need. Beyond the boxes, hundreds of already cleaned and dried gourds were stored. 77 year old Myrna was helping her 83 year old husband unload a crate from a cart. "We work together, and our neighbors helped with the planting this year." Earl proudly shows me how he converted a wheelbarrow into a flat bed cart to move produce. He tells me, "We've been farming here since 1971. I bought the 3 acres of land for seven thousand dollars back then and we built a house on it." A working class family would be unable to purchase land around here now - the properties around them are sold for millions, not thousands, of dollars.
I was there for the cheaper, dirty gourds so we went around back. As I was picking gourds from a large wooden bin, a neighbor showed up to use the wireless and chat. Myrna explained that her neighbor had gone 4 months without electricity this year, when the power lines down the road just melted into the ground. She and Earl evacuated three times this year, but she says that she would never leave the area. "It's all I've ever known." She was born four miles from where the farm is, and Earl's family "followed the fruit," working as pickers from Missouri to California. Myrna points to the ridge of trees across the street - "that's where the fire stopped two years ago." Then she points to the edge of the field behind us - "that's where the fire stopped this year."
"I don't know why, but God spared this farm," she says.
Whoever Myrna and Earl's God is, if they did indeed spare this farm, it was a wise decision.
In October of 2021 I visited Myrna again. A lot had changed since I last made the trip to Early Bird’s Place. Sadly, Earl had passed away after contracting covid in the winter of 2020. His memorial service was on what would have been their 65th anniversary. Myrna is now tending solo to the farm's 40 chickens and sizable vegetable garden. Just like last year, their garage was still loaded with boxes of produce for a local food pantry. In spite of osteoporosis in both knees, she's planning to buy her own tractor this year so she doesn't have to ask for help with the plowing. We had a great chat and I hope to visit again to help plant some seedlings in the spring. I'm beyond grateful for the chance to see her today and stock up on gourds and elder wisdom. She gifted Blake a bucket of black cherry tomatoes and some pomegranates too. And she showed us her 5 star fertilizer, a pile of rhinoceros poop from her friends who work at Safari West. We talked about so much! Grief, raising orphaned baby goats, building birdhouses, and reconnecting with the now grown children who she helped to raise when she ran a daycare. What a rare and inspiring person!
To visit Myrna's farm and purchase gourds and/or produce, contact Early Bird's Place in Healdsburg, CA. https://www.facebook.com/mrsearlybird
