“But how will they learn calculus?”  I heard that question repeatedly when we started on our homeschooling journey.  It was a pre-corona world, where advanced mastery of math and sciences, expansive  extra-curricular involvement and stellar test scores were the necessary recipe for the necessary acceptance at that necessary university, which was supposed to unveil the necessary career for the necessary middle-class life.

I was more interested in making sure my kids learned how to cook breakfast.  To the college-educated career-track professional, my family’s vocation could seem quaint.  For a few years we enjoyed a spike in popularity because small farmers appeared hip, trendy and photogenic; but in the eyes of mainstream America, we were essentially on the verge of obsolescence.   Our Sap Bush Hollow family made our way in this world like most of the farmers before World War II: we grew food for ourselves and our community; we relied on family labor; and we reduced our need for big incomes with basic domestic self-reliance skills (cleaning, mending, homegrown entertainment, home-cooking, etc).  

When Bob’s and my advanced degrees failed to unveil a life with more promise and opportunity than a life on the land with my family, we went back to my roots.  Hence, calculus was a far lower educational goal than teaching our kids to scramble eggs.  

I’m reflecting on this journey as my teenage daughters pile into bed with me before going off to sleep.  We’ve climbed the stairs after our nightly indulgence of watching an episode of one of our favorite shows.  Tonight, in light of the news about the Wendy’s chains running out of meat,  Bob and I also showed all three kids old Where’s the Beef commercials.  They’ve never eaten at a Wendy’s or any fast food restaurant, so the significance of this appears lost on them.  They’re more interested in  telling me about their days’ work on the farm:  Saoirse, my fashion maven who has taken to wearing steampunk and renaissance outfits with  her face mask when she goes to Cobleskill, describes in graphic detail her efforts to dislodge a feces blockage for a newborn lamb while Corey held it for her.   Ula expresses the sorrow we all feel over rounding up the first batch of chickens for processing.  Saoirse asks me to talk her through the process of pulling a lamb.  Ula wants to trouble-shoot the steps to take when the head comes out before the feet.  Saoirse tells about stripping a ewe’s udder that afternoon as the afterbirth released, describing the loud splat as it hit the bedding pack on the barn floor.  Both girls giggle as they wiggle their fingers to imitate the ways a newborn lamb communicates with its tail:  full waggle means HUNGRY.  Tiny twitching means I gotta poop!

I am agog at all three of these kids: at their joy in the farm work; their endless labors without complaint; the wisdom and care they employ as they balance the stress of the weather and these times with the dysfunctional quirks of our family, and the needs of the animals; and their rapture as they explore the mountains and hillsides when not working.

I still haven’t gotten around to teaching any calculus.  And I’d be a liar if I didn’t admit there were times before this pandemic when I worried I was doing them a disservice.  Homeschooling, for us, has structure, but nothing like a conventional school day….Much less the new online schooling that public schools have had to implement overnight.   Lessons are a tiny part of the day, conducted in under two hours four mornings each week.  The rest of my kids’ time goes to pursuing interests and helping in the family business. 

While they pass all their standardized testing, they’ve never gotten perfect scores on any test ever.  Saoirse outright refused to sit for a college entrance exam (let alone consider applying), and I don’t think Ula’s eyesight would even permit her to endure a prolonged timed test.  As their peers pursued selective private schools, AP coursework and prestigious internships, my kids had their moments of doubt, too.  Their friends, it seemed, were preparing to do something “important” with their futures.

Were we going in the wrong direction?  Should we push harder?  Achieve more?

Pushing too hard took the joy out of learning.  Racing to too many activities ripped at the seams of the family business, or just ruined our fun times hanging out together.  For us, the choice to homeschool was an engagement with learning, but a dismissal of much modern conventional academic success.  It was also a choice to safeguard a dying culture; to teach our kids how so many generations of our family and neighbors have lived, so that we may pass this land on to them, and they may know how to make a life in harmony with it.

My eyelids are growing heavy as they talk.  While they’ve been dealing with the physical work on the farm, I’ve been dealing with the invisible work: insurance policies, bookkeeping, customer communications.  We’re all worn out.  But as I drift off to sleep, my chest puffs with pride.  Because of these kids, 196 chickens will find their way to 196 dinner tables next week. And in two weeks, 150 more will go out.  And in two weeks, another 150 more.  These lambs they are caring for will move out to pasture with their mommies next week, and they will nourish local families all winter long.  

I think about my generation’s “necessary” recipe for success: the necessary extra-curriculuars, the necessary test scores, the necessary college, the necessary career.  It’s all upside down now.  Colleges are uncertain they’ll be opening their doors, students are uncertain whether they’ll be attending.  Many folks who managed to score those necessary careers after college are suddenly wondering just how necessary they are.  And many are even wondering about what parts of a middle class life are still necessary.

But here on this land, I drift off to sleep with gratitude in my heart for these three kids.  True, nobody taught them calculus.  And they are not using their academic time to knuckle down in advanced mathematics with the plan of someday doing something important.  As the days grow long and the season makes its demands, they are learning on their feet, making choices every day to do something important right now.    And our community is benefiting with the food security they provide.  Maybe they’ll eventually go to college.  Maybe they won’t.  But no matter what happens, after life returns to normal, these three kids will know that, during one of the hardest periods in the recent history of this world, they’re essential.

Corey, Saoirse and Ula:  I love you all.  Thank you for what you’re doing.

*Just for the record, they also have marathon Minecraft sessions.  They’re not totally pure!