Category: flowers and plants

(Farmer John’s Dahlias)

Today I was down at the wonderful wholesale flower place on Hwy 1–the one with yards and yards of orchids and indoor and outdoor plants and flowers and, oh gosh, everything that’s green and pink and red and yellow and multi-colored and I better stop because I’ll want to buy everything and then so will you…

I walked outside into the parking lot, loaded down with my flowerful treasures, when I saw these luscious, blood-red, deep deep red, Dahlias. Full and fluffy and well-fed flowers that were so dressed up they looked like they were going out dancing…They were waiting patiently in the back of an open van.

Several buckets were filled with these long-legged, freshly cut lusty red Dahlias–and I sighed, biting my lip, wishing I could go back inside and buy a bunch…They’d look so good in my house…

Instead I met the man who belonged with the gorgeous Dahlias, or vice versa… I was with a friend who told me, “That’s Farmer John. He’s political, he’s well known around town.”

I remembered Farmer John’s political signs on Hwy 92…I was thinking, “What did he run for?” Then I said it out loud.

“I’m on the City Council,” he told me gravely.

I noticed he was wearing overalls, a farmer, the real thing.

He asked my name. I told him and there was a glint of recognition in his eyes.

“The artist,” he said.

Wow, I thought—now I’m an “artist”–that’s a step up from carrying the moniker “local historian” for so many years.

Back to the Dahlias.

“I just picked them,” Farmer John said, explaining that he delivered flowers to the nursery every week.

The subject then turned from flowers to Half Moon Bay and Farmer John said, “All the travel writers are coming here now. Half Moon Bay’s the ‘in’ place.”

He also told me that he gives “around the bonfire talks” to corporate groups, stories of his adventures in San Gregorio & Pescadero–and other historical stuff that’s been passed down to him over the past 60 years, sometimes with a little hyperbole thrown in.

Farmer John’s blooms can be admired and bought at Half Moon Bay’s Farmer’s Market–

(Farmer John)