She has found that farming is grueling, "the hardest I've ever worked in my life." The hours seem endless on their D&S Farm, planting and harvesting in the fields, or driving to farmers markets throughout the Washington area to sell their produce. Then there's maintaining machinery, working out farm finances, preparing jams and preserves. And yet, Gragan can rattle off all that she doesn't miss about urban life: the commute, rush hour, dealing with corporations and Congress.
"It's kind of amazing, to see that we've made this work," she said. "That we've got 1,000-plus fruit trees that are healthy, and fruit that restaurants and customers want." It has taken several years, but the farm now makes a profit, she said, though she and her husband still supplement their farm income with part-time work in the winter.
Scott and Tanya Hertzberg grow vegetables and flowers organically on nine acres in southern Prince George's County.
(Photos Andrea Bruce Woodall -- The Washington Post)
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Kathy York, 49, and her husband, Sandy, have operated the Scarborough Farm cut flower business in Mechanicsville for nearly a decade. She remembers the last straw in her decision to quit her sales support job for Xerox Corp.
"The commute from Washington was taking me two hours, and by the time I got home, I would be a raving maniac," she said. "One night it took me five hours to get home. That was when I said, 'Let's try to make this farm pay for itself.' "
York grows more than 100 varieties of flowers behind her house, including lisianthus, bleeding hearts and dahlias. One recent morning, she moved through the rows of flowers, snipping stems and stripping off excess leaves. She wore paint-spattered overalls and had rubber bands around a bronzed forearm.
Farm life can be idyllic at times, she said, watching dragonflies bob through the flowers, smelling the cinnamon basil. She can hear the soothing clop of Mennonite buggies out on the road. But she also has found farm work to be no fantasy job.
"People think farming, 'so beautiful, so romantic.' But they don't see me when I'm out here sweaty and dirty, when it's raining or when the mosquitoes are angry," she said.
In addition, making a profit off the fields is a constant challenge, she said. She sells flowers to florists, does wedding arrangements and has a subscription service through which customers pick up fresh flowers weekly at her farm. Still, her husband, Sandy, continues to do brick and mortar work to help pay the bills.
Scott Hertzberg said revenue from his organic farm, the Jug Bay Market Garden, has doubled each year since he and his wife opened it. He also runs a subscription service, selling fresh vegetables. But farming doesn't generate enough money to cover the couple's year-round expenses, he said.
Hertzberg said his wife probably will have to keep her full-time job in the city. As for his future as an office-bound librarian, he said, "I've just realized by now I'm never going to make it in the professional working world."
Just after dawn on a recent Wednesday, the mist hung low in Hertzberg's sloping field, where he enjoys calculating whether the recently planted zinnias and green beans will outrace the first frost.
He had shed his wool sweater, and the sun was drying the dew off his work pants. The next day, he would be back in his Justice Department cubicle, a tie knotted to his neck. He bent to examine winter squash that had spoiled after the heavy rains and made a mental note to plant them much earlier next year. After all, it is his decision to make.
