My family and I joined Monroe Organic Farms’ CSA this past year. Each week, Monroe would drop off a handful of shares at a neighbor’s home and everyone would come by to pick up their share. Along with getting big bags of beautiful produce each week, I got to know the Monroe family more deeply, along with Mary Ann, my neighbor who sat in her garage for two hours every week distributing the shares.

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. It’s a mutually beneficial partnership between farmers and consumers. By purchasing a share of the harvest in advance, members support the farm upfront and in return, receive regular portions of fresh, seasonal produce throughout the season.

When you join a CSA, you agree to share in both the risks and the rewards of farming. A challenging season may bring smaller yields, while a flourishing year overflows with abundance. At its core, a CSA is about joining the journey with a local farm. Advanced payment gives farmers the stability they need to plan, plant, and nurture the season ahead of time. It’s a way of saying, we value your work, while choosing local, nutrient-dense food and the farmers who grow it (rather than lettuce shipped from 2,000 miles away).

A CSA is also a beautiful way to connect more deeply with the individuals who grow your food, the seasons we all live within, and the land that we live on. As farmers ride the whims of the growing season, we get to ride alongside them… choosing people in our community and the shared purpose of supporting local food that carries far more meaning than a grocery run. When we eat carrots harvested by someone whose name and story we know, those carrots take on greater purpose. Sitting down to a meal made from the hands of farmers we’re in relationship with transforms the table itself and the food becomes more than fuel - it becomes connection, gratitude, and community shared with everyone partaking.

Then there’s the lovely mystery of the vegetables that show up in my CSA box each week! Sure, I can only eat so many potatoes and squash at a time, but the abundance pushes me to get creative. And sometimes, creativity looks like giving. When there’s more than my family can eat, I love cooking up the extra produce and blessing neighbors with warm meals from our kitchen. In an odd way, both giving and receiving a meal feels vulnerable. Cooking for someone else means exposing your food, your style, your skill (or lack thereof). Receiving a meal means opening yourself to eat something you didn’t plan, shop for, or prepare yourself. And yet, that exchange is where the beauty lies… food as a bridge that is both humbling and connecting us in ways nothing else quite can.

Over the time frame of the CSA, the pickup host, Mary Ann, ended up learning my kids’ names and asking about them, providing advice about my job, and getting updates on the many house projects I had going on. I learned about her grown children, her travels, and her passion for CSAs. Picking up food from her home each week wasn’t just about the produce, it was about fostering a new relationship with a neighbor while receiving stunning, seasonal food from farmers I was learning to deeply love. It was about learning from others how to slow down and sit in the driveway, listening to strangers and grounding ourselves in present company and locally grown food. Buying into a food ecosystem is driving a connection to the person, the seasons, and the land. It’s a beautiful rejection of the fast paced food world we’ve come to accept and we’ve become addicted to. And it's surrendering to the good design of nature’s pace.