A Tiny Homestead

Appalachian Highlands Farmers Magazine

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Today I'm talking with Aaron at Appalachian Highlands Farmers Magazine. You can follow on Facebook as well.

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00:00

You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. I'm your host, Mary Lewis. Today I'm talking with Aaron at Appalachian Highlands Farmers Magazine, and you are where? I'm in Bristol, Virginia. Okay. Welcome, Aaron. Thank you for being here. Thank you. I appreciate being here. So how's the weather there? It is...

00:29

study in a little bit chilly.  You're lucky. It is very muggy in Minnesota. That's where I am. This is about as this is the first  couple of days we haven't had rain since I've been here. uh Oh, okay. So are you new to there or  what's up with that? I've been here about two years.  Um, I'm a transplant from Southern California,  um,  and still moved out here just to retire. And then I figured out I can't retire.

00:59

So I started getting busy again. Yeah, my husband and I are both in our mid fifties and anytime retirement comes up in conversation, we just do that very sardonic laugh and go, we're never retiring because it's not going to do us any good to retire. Yeah. And it's also not good for your brain to sit off that much, you know? Absolutely. Yeah. My dad retired over 10 years ago. He is now 80.

01:28

I think  and He acts like he's 50. He lives like he's 50. You would never know. He was 83 years old. So I'm very proud of  All right, so tell me a little bit about yourself and about your magazine Okay, well I was gonna mention that I'm planning out here from Southern California in the mountains of Southern California About 5,000 so I come from a kind of a rural

01:58

not rural really, it's urban forest I guess you could call it, it's a little town called Crestline, California. um I  spent most of my career in  the printing business and when I say print I mean magazines, newspapers, that type of thing. um My education is actually graphic communication, kind dawned into the print business and ended up consulting with authors.

02:25

These are the things that I like the San Francisco Chronicle, San Diego New New York Review, and people like that. About, you know, how they used to go out and do their layout design. So, later on in the managing, I my little hometown newspaper at the time. It was called the Alpenhorn Nude. It addressed my town. And I worked there.

02:54

for a while and I just wanted to  it. was  definitely going to buy it from after that fence fell through and I moved away to Montana for five years and I came back and it turns out somebody had bought it from the old owner and he was not doing well with it and so I was joking, strictly a joke. I wrote up the contracts for me purchasing it  and was supposed to just be something funny.

03:24

And I said, no, I'll buy it for $295.

03:29

And that was how much they that's how much money they were in the black for the year.  Uh  huh. So he's he he's didn't even look at it. He just said, you know what, where's this? Where do I  Wow.  Right. And I ended up publishing that newspaper and upgrading the branding on it. It had already been changed to to a new name, which was the  Alpine Mountain here in this case.

03:58

It was just a typical little newspaper, a real small town newspaper. Nothing's honestly known, no stories or anything like that. No politics. So then I retired, moved out here, got calls from a son of mine back in California who owns stable farmer's markets, some private farmer's markets. And he said, you know what, I want you to do my marketing for me.

04:26

So what I want to do is create a farmer's market newspaper. Okay. And I said, sir, I'll do that. I put one together, you know, a mock up of one and pricing, I'll be distribute distributing that. And when he thought it was going to cost him 20 grams, was looking for alternatives. So I said, well, why don't you do an online news? You know, the money. And so that was the

04:56

impetus for creating something called the California, well, it's called the farmer market times. And it's at ca farmers market.com. And it's just mainly just really a marketing tool to promote each farm. But it's best media, news and stuff. And so I thought, you know, I live out here in the middle of the last year where everyone's farming, farming culture.

05:26

I was eating on a call. I buy my meat from a place around the corner. It just occurred to me. that's kind of what I do. it turns out, there should be some kind of a really neat thing. I haven't made any money on it. But the whole idea is that once it's mastered, I can duplicate that anywhere in the country if I want to.

05:56

All I got to have is somebody that wants to do the reporting or get any storage. Um, and I can create like a franchise out of it. And like I said, I haven't made any money. So, um, I don't know if I ever will, but doesn't matter. move to keep playing from beach. So it just turned out to be this really neat thing and it has a side. I think I'm already well aware.

06:42

to have the lecture, gonna be, people are be a little bit cautious about you and I'm well aware. But this is a way, this has turned out to be a really great way of me acclimating to the culture here, which is quite different  and doing it in a very respectful way that respects the culture of this region.  I met a lot of nice people that I probably would have never met before  and

07:11

It's on a level that connects with them in a way. Don't think that could have done that. Yeah. you're not into gardening or growing your own meat, then you probably wouldn't have had a connection. Is the lifestyle there slower? Is it, I don't know, more peaceful or is it not? It is. Yes, I think so. Now I come from a little tiny town in California. True. Yeah.

07:41

You know, it was not a fast paced place anyway, but there was a lot of community involved there. You know, was just on the map board and this could be the way it is. And to be honest, slowing down a little bit didn't hurt my feelings. So it is a slower paced environment. Your people are not as rushed. They're not as stressed, I think. And also the population out here is considerably older too, in general. So

08:11

There's that.  Sure.  OK, so I was looking at your website and you cover  what areas? Well, that's interesting. Bring that up. It started off where I was going to cover from  Johnson City, Tennessee and north up into Virginia to about I was thinking, though. Like.  Damascus, Virginia, so not a big, I mean, that's easy to.

08:40

That's a real easy drive. And then somebody informed me  that if I'm going to call it Appalachian Highlands,  then I got to expand my horizons a little bit and go at least from Asheville, North Carolina, up to Whistler, Virginia.  So the reason they said Asheville is because the whole farming market scene, the marine experience here in Virginia,  that all changed.

09:11

That area has  what? One, two, it has six farmers markets that I'm aware of  operating in the Asheville area. And they're the ones that started using this going on, but the else has copied it. So  I said, all right, I'll agree to that. m then, you know, West Virginia, some parts of West Virginia also are including in this too. So.  So it's like three states. Yes.

09:40

It's actually Tennessee, North Carolina, West Virginia  and Virginia. Okay, so four states.  Okay, cool.  And how do you go about finding your story ideas? Because  I, as a podcaster, I just go find people who post on social media and like I found you and message them and say, hey, can you come talk to me? And people typically say yes if they have time. But is it that easy for you?

10:10

It's a little bit more involved for me because I'm physically going to them. em And the way I find them is a number of different ways. But so when we came here, I made friends with my neighbors who own, they're very well known people, the Sleanor family over here and they own a farm. um And they are very present on Facebook.  So when I say young couple, they're, when I say young compared to me, I think they're in there.

10:39

probably in their 30s, maybe early 40s.  They are very active on Facebook, so I ran into them there. And then once I got to know them and meet them at their farm, they have a farm that has, where they do a lot of agritourism, know, they have even rides that they created out there. And they look like these and they pull it behind the track into the cubes and have a farm made. Fun! Yeah, super fun.

11:09

They have weddings, it's pretty neat. And so once I got to meet them, it turns out they also own the local meat packing plant, which is called Washington County Meat Packing. So now I can buy meat from them that they raised. Well, not necessarily, but most of the time it's that they raise because they also do packing for other farmers. But sure. And then.

11:38

They have had a number of charitable events that I've covered. And at those I meet people and then I go to all the farm so that I can go to and then I always meet people there and that is a spin-off. There's always spin-off stories. So a great one is I went to the Johnson City Farmers Market, City, Tennessee, and I'm I'm going to around with every vendor. You know, it's just for a minute, find out what's it doing, how I'm doing it.

12:08

all that kind of stuff. I met this artist down there and I wrote about him as a separate story because he was just so interesting. And so I picked up an extra story there or I'll meet another farmer, someone that's about to go out. Someone named Damascus Wazina who's doing this. It's actually the Damascus farmer's work, Sweden, that does topical culture and just all kinds of neat mottling.

12:38

science-y things.  then they introduced me to other people and  I just keep aware of events and just mix around there. Last week we had Pepperfest in Bristol, Tennessee. um It's all about

13:06

fun, fun, fun, fun. love it. Um,  uh, there's an old saying regarding people and it said something about if you can,  if you can do the thing, do the thing. But if you can't do the thing, teach the thing.  And,  and I feel like what you do and what I do  is we're trying to get the information out about what people are doing to improve their communities or the world or however you want to say it.

13:36

And  I love people like you because you aren't necessarily growing a hundred foot by 150 foot farmer market garden to sell stuff out of.  You are promoting the people who are doing that kind of thing. Yeah, that's exactly right.  And it originally started out that it's  kind of interesting really about that. The original intent, I created the farmer market times in California was to promote

14:05

to promote to farmers that those farmers want. It turns out that the owner of that, that hired me to do it, doesn't want to do that. And the reason he doesn't, he doesn't want any competitors getting his vendors. So I'm trying real hard to talk him into, wait a minute, is everybody going to be loyal to you? If you promote them, if you don't, then there's no loyalty to you. So it worked out that way.

14:34

Here's the thing, I'm trying to learn as much as I can about this area. So farming is a big deal. mean, everybody's either a farmer or, know, a farm to table is a huge thing here too. And I cover that kind of stuff. But I'm also kind of expanding into some more.

14:55

I think interesting things that aren't necessarily farm related, they are kind of like,  I give a story about the radio station that was in Exilist  at  the first place of  Country Music Museum in Bristol.  It's a radio station, it's an operating radio station that is playing  all kinds of music, but it's country.

15:26

and the city. But he said, here's a living exhibit at the museum.  So they put on shows all the time. So I had an opportunity to cover them. So I'm actually expanding a little bit of what I'm There's a little store in Virginia that has studies  a gallery store for  artists in the region.  all the art that they have displays artists that they can fill that. I'm going to start.

15:55

And the good thing about that is that I get to do some focus on those artists at some point. So if I do a big picture story about something like a farmer's market, I'll always find people in there that will give me some side stories. And it's just that now I have people calling me and going, yeah, I need to do a story about this. sure. Awesome. It's like the tagline for my podcast is the podcast.

16:25

comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters.  And then I have a hyphen and then I say, and topics adjacent, because  I can only find so many people to talk to until it does become adjacent. I talked to a guy a year ago about green burials because green burials are about kind of protecting and preserving the earth. And as someone who really enjoys my garden, I would like the earth to be doing what it needs to do.

16:55

And he was fabulous. He's going to come back and talk to me once we can get our technical difficulties worked out. He was supposed to talk to me the other day and he couldn't get logged into the recording room. So we have to figure that out. But  there are so many things that are adjacent and everything  goes hand in hand. I mean, the radio station. Appalachia  is very  big into music. That's where a lot of our

17:23

country music started. and  music is really important to farmers because they play the radio in the barn for the cows.  It's a part of the culture and the culture.  The culture is not one thing. It's a whole bunch of things.  And all of those things play off each other. So that's absolutely correct. Yeah, it's all one big web. It's craziness. Also that particular web, particular radio station does things like

17:53

them to local farmers and they do a crop report  stuff too. So it all ties in somehow  and even if doesn't, I don't care if I'm off track sometimes, no one's spamming me.  So  I can get off track if I want to. Sure. It's your thing. Just like this podcast is mine. And if I want to interview a guy who's really nice about green burials, I can do it.

18:21

The  other thing that I think that we forget, because  not all of us are older than dirt, is that  radio  and newspapers were the way people used to get their news. That was it.  And so, of course, radio had crop information and  the price of pork bellies or whatever back when.  And  newspapers used to report  news. Yes.

18:50

Yeah, it's not crazy these days. It's almost depressing really. Yeah. Well, I do it's depressing. don't think you say almost. It is actually quite depressing. Because even the amount of information that's thrown at people and then you have to sit and parse that to get to the part that's really right and or through or know, speckled with somebody's opinion or whatever, know, used to be this way of doing it to your board. Yeah.

19:18

Yeah, the only news I trust is the notification that I get on my phone from the AP website because I still trust the AP. But anything else, I'm like, hmm, let me go check AP before I say anything. That's exactly right. I feel kind of the same way. Or I'll listen to somebody, but then I'm going to have to listen to people. You know what I mean? Or sometimes it may be true.

19:47

something that may be true, but it's based on a kernel of truth. It isn't really the whole thing. You you've to get the whole story. You know, so and, you know, I know they still have radio. I listen to it in my car, mostly. But I think that's even gotten a little bit crazy. you know, and people have said for a long time that newspapers were dying. And I would argue that they're not.

20:17

they are changing, they need to change. I think people still like to look at a newspaper physically. It's just that sometimes the stories are not relevant to younger people. don't understand any, I'm saying newspaper, so newspaper business has to examine their business models all the time and continually improve and continually update. But I think you'll get younger people

20:46

reading these great pieces of material as well.  Oh, sure. Of course. And the other thing is that  I heard a statistic the other day and I'm a big, big word nerd. I love books. I love to read. I'm actually in middle of writing an article right now  for Homestead Living Magazine  and  I freaking love words.  And I heard a terrible statistic the other day that

21:13

reading is just not happening anymore with our younger generation.  And I'm

21:21

That's okay.  Reading is not something the younger generation is doing now. And it makes me  so incredibly sad. Yeah, it's going to have some consequences at some point, think.  At some point you can only, you know,  dump things down as bad as you out. think I'll say that.  can only  make things simple for so long before the simplicity makes things bright.

21:49

I think that's common soon.  Yes,  and I don't  want to get too deep on this, but reading  is one of those things that teaches people critical thinking. And critical thinking is not as  common as it used to be either.  And so  I don't want reading to go away. I raised four kids, they all  love to read. And  one of them has a child.

22:18

The other three do not have kids and she loves to read and I hope that that gets passed down from from me to him to her. Yeah, I hope so too. have, I have a bunch of, I have four daughters and um, um, they all love to read, which is great. really happy. Like one of them, the youngest one, when she was a kid, did not want to watch TV or anything like that. She said, give me a book.

22:48

and then all what happened is she'd get a book  and like kind of dumb stuff like, know,  these are empire novels. She also likes Shakespeare, things like that, too. But  her problem was she would read a book and then she watched the movie. And she say, that's not how it happened.  And by the way, that guy doesn't look anything like that. You know, mean, stuff like that. oh

23:14

She preferred the book because she could put her own imagination in there and make those characters do what she thought they should  or the way they were doing things  he thought it ought to be done.  And the way they looked was the way she imagined it looked. And that's the advantage that reading has because if you have someone telling you a story. And, you know, like on a movie, they tell you what it looks like, they show you what it looks like. um

23:41

you don't get the imagination, you don't get the exercise, your imagination as much as you should. You know? I'm happy about the fact that your food reads and my form reads, maybe that's good sign. Maybe there's hope for the world, I also don't want to go too deep on this, but it's relevant to the conversation about how newspapers used to report the news. I was

24:09

scrolling through my phone this morning looking for more people to talk to because that's what I do. And I had the news on in the background and our president announced that they caught the person they think shot Charlie Kirk yesterday. And no news, nobody. AP hadn't come out with it, nothing yet. And I looked at the TV and said, what the F? And I actually said the word because our president is not supposed to deliver that kind of news.

24:37

That's not his job. And it's for the first time in a long time, something really truly surprised me. I was like, why? Why is he the one telling us? Well, yeah. and again, of course, don't want to get political sauce. I'll keep this in a generics. Yeah, that's what I'm trying to do. The danger I feel, because it's not the only comment he's made about it.

25:07

you know, he's been clear about it. It's feelings about the whole incident and all that kind of stuff. But the problem with that is that when this guy goes to trial, he's going to be able to say, hey, it's from the bat. The president was spreading the word that I did this. that means he's not going to get a fair trial. And that means that could end in a mistrial because or even a strong adopt because he can't get trial because everybody's already forced.

25:35

And that's the problem with presidents. And that's why presidents have always traditionally kept quiet about criminal cases. Right. Exactly. Because in this country, we're supposed to have rules and laws and channels of how information gets disseminated.  That's why we call it  news. So, yeah, I was just dumbfounded. I could not  wrap my head around it for about 10 minutes. And then I was like,

26:02

It's just another thing that's going on right now that makes no sense. I'm just going to let it go. I were that guy's attorney, I'd already be all over that. I'd be playing in that. Right down the line, that would be my plan, my defense plan. It's like, yeah, you know what? It doesn't matter in the case because he's talking to his friends. So, you know. Yeah. And the other thing that I thought about when that came out and who they've got arrested for is that my youngest son is actually a year older.

26:32

than the person they've arrested. And I'm just like, holy crap, what is our world coming to? 22 years old. Yeah, don't, I certainly don't know what motives were at Meanwhile, they, meanwhile, they been putting it out there, there are still plenty of people.

26:59

that  are spreading entirely false information about  it. That's just kind of  an additional problem with news. People get news, they think it's news, it's not news. But they get information from people who aren't reliable to give it.  And  then it spirals, it just keeps going.  Yeah, it's a problem. And considering that you are in the  actual magazine world and I am in the podcasting world,

27:29

This is very, very relevant to both of us because  no one should die for expressing their opinion in a reasonable manner and  inviting open discourse to  talk about what is going on  and come to some kind of resolution. And I really wanted to say that today because  I didn't even know who Charlie Kirk was until two days ago because it's not on my radar. But I'm not necessarily a fan.

27:57

of his opinions, but I am a fan of the fact that it's another person in the world trying to invite conversation to solve things. Right. I'm going to say this all day long, that I'm absolutely a believer in three-states. And I think when that three-states is missed in a way that's, know, insolent or whatever.

28:26

The best way to counter that is with rational speech. Speech against speech is the best way to debate, open debate um is the best way to handle things.  Violence tends,  well, in my  observation of history, political violence does nothing except silence, free speech, but it also creates martyrs. And martyrs create

28:56

more violence and that's nice to get out of control after a while. So I mean, at some point that just becomes a big problem. becomes, you know, it becomes untenable. You're going to end up with war or something like that. I don't want to go down that road, but you know, you get one guy and it does this and then another guy got to get revenge and another guy's getting revenge. I say, solve it with, with words. Yep.

29:25

Absolutely. And  I don't really talk politics on the podcast, but this one kind of shook me a little bit. And as someone who is very, um I don't know, I'm very careful with my privacy as far as I can be, even though I do a podcast, I was like, you know, this is not okay. You can't have people killing people because they're talking with other people  and trying to come to some kind of consensus on opinion. And I don't like it.

29:55

So I want to do a strongly that the mental. Uh huh. you believe that the Americans in general do not see this as an approach? Everything's appropriate. I have the least I hope. so too. It's not good. And of course, and of course yesterday was the anniversary of 9 11. And so you had.

30:21

Wednesday's crap and then you had all the nostalgia and reminiscing and  and sadness for 9-eleven and I was just like, okay on my podcast the next time I talk on my podcast I'm just gonna tell everybody you gotta live while you're here. You gotta try to do something good and when you're dead, it's suddenly not your problem anymore, but don't leave problems for everybody else. Yeah, I think that's a really good philosophy.  Um,  I don't know.

30:51

What was it? Don't remember what that dumb movie was.  With Bill and Bill and Ted's excellent adventure, then they have a little saying at the end of something whenever they said something like be awesome to each other or something like every other. Exactly. Something like that. Like be kind to each other. eh OK, the excellent to each other, I think is what it was. Excellent to exactly. And you know what the thing about the news with Americans, we have a lot in this country to be proud of.

31:20

In terms of universally as Americans, we so many things that we can celebrate about being Americans.  honestly think,  we can just learn to treat each other nicely and  celebrate those things that we have in common that aren't American, quintessentially American things. You know what? We'll be just fine.  And everyone will live a happier life that way if we could just all focus on those things.

31:50

Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And part of the reason that I love this community that I've built with the podcast is because everybody in this community of home studying and cottage food producing and crafting  and topics adjacent like you  are all really kind and giving and doing something to leave a positive mark on the world. And the more people we have like that, the better it's going to be. I feel like part of that comes from the fact that you're doing something that's tangible and real. Yeah.

32:19

You know what mean? Like I think if you spend too much time focused on, you know, you know, we just, you know, I'm one of the  important the computer most of the time because I'm producing something that I think is, that is real.  And, you know, but there's people who are living fantasy life inside their computers and inside their TVs and stuff like that.  They're just immersed in the,  all of the fantasy that's available to them. And I think that's dangerous.

32:48

So when you have homesteaders, farmers, people who do podcasts, people who do  magazines, they're creating something.  And uh I think that's, it's not all input, it's some of its output. So that's the beautiful thing about it. I think when someone spends all their time  inputting information from all these different crazy sources, that's damaging to the soul.

33:18

things into balancing some public of something good,  know,  poetry writing, farming,  eating vegetables, creating, you know, food and things like that. I think you become a better human being. I think you become a more calm human being doing those things. I don't think that you can give to the world and  not be a good person. It's when you take from the world constantly that it's hard to remain being a good person.

33:47

ah I tried to keep these to half an hour, Aaron, and we got a little deeper than I meant to on stuff that isn't really what I wanted to talk about, but I feel like it was really important.  And again, I'm going to stick to it. Everybody try to do something nice at least once a day for somebody or for another living creature,  or I don't know, talk to a plant, tell it it's pretty,  something  nice, and you will be a better person for it. Agreed.  Where can people find you?

34:16

So it's real easy, ahfmagazine.com. Okay, awesome. And what are you on Facebook? Anything to ask? Oh, wait a minute. I got to look, hold on. I think it's under Appalachian Islands Farmers Magazine. Yep, sounds right. Are you on Instagram at all?

34:44

Uh, have an account, but I haven't populated it much. I've only been doing this for a few months. So I don't really have a chance to get involved in too much more than what I've been doing. So, right. I think I've been doing it. Well, maybe it's longer than I thought. It's a time is time is getting past me here on some of this stuff. Um, yeah. So I don't know if I'm going to end up going that dress. I might. Okay. At some point it becomes a job.

35:14

Yeah, and when it becomes a job, it's not a passion anymore. And then you're like, do I really want to do this? Okay, as always, people can find me at atinyhomesteadpodcast.com. And Aaron, thank you for going out in the world and finding good stories and promoting good people. I appreciate it. And thank you. Thank you for what you do. I appreciate that as well. All right. Have a great day. You too.

 

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A Tiny HomesteadBy Mary E Lewis