I’ve come to see people in two distinct ways. Some enrich my life; some diminish my life.
Amy McLenithan has enriched my life, consciously or not.
The founder and sole proprietor and staff of Amy’s Country Kitchen, a bright red food wagon down the road from our farm, Amy is one of the people who matter in my life, and who have changed it somewhat.
I love photographing and documenting strong women who enrich my life, they should be acknowledged, and they are slowly but clearly changing our world.
Amy and her husband run the Cambridge Valley Animal Auction, every Tuesday the trailers come pouring in from New York State and New England to buy and sell farm animals.
The farmers pull in in their giant trailers and hang around for hours catching up and talking to one another.
For 20 years, Amy has been cooking dinners for them inside.
This year, she’s taken her business outside, on the busy highway just down the hill from the auction. She serves the farmers, but also people driving by and people like me.
Getting coffee and/or breakfast from Amy is not a cherished part of my morning, it just feels, as Jean’s Place does, like family.
Amy works unbelievably hard, but she is focused, cheerful, and can cook. In the warm weather, there are comfortable tables to sit at. In the winter, I bring the food back to the farmhouse.
Amy has spent her life in the farm culture and our town. In the morning, the farmers and highway workers and teachers pile in for coffee or eggs or cheese and egg sandwiches.
She’s known most of them for years.
She is easy to talk to. She knows the story of every accident or fire within miles and keeps me up to date on the challenges and joys of running a small business. She has good days and had days, but her spunky business is doing well.
I don’t know if we are friends yet, but it feels like it.
It’s hard work, but I get the feeling she loves what she does. People who love what they do are sacred to me, totems of a world that is harder and harder on individuals who have callings rather than jobs.
And I love the background noises from the auction house right above the food trailer – cows mooing, bellowing, snorting and grunting.
Every morning, the highway crews gather in her heated wooden shed to drink their coffee and shoot the breeze. I don’t go in there; it’s too cramped and close to me. But it is warm.
I go into town every morning to check my post office box or go to the bank, and when I’m done, I text Amy, often sending her a talking Emoji of a cow, telling her I’m on the way for coffee, a homemade muffin, sometimes an egg and cheese sandwich.
She is a good story-teller, and always has a new story for me. She is also a wife and mother and seems to love taking care of people.
She is a born multi-tasker.
Amy loves my talking cow Emoji’s (thanks, Steve Jobs) and sometimes shares them with incredulous farmers, who shake their heads in wonder. When I pull up in my SUV, my decaf coffee is waiting for me on her counter, just like I like it, two packets of artificial sweetener, lite and hot.
I love coffee, but after my heart surgery, I had to stop drinking it. Decaf has the same effect on me.
I bring the coffee back to my study and go to work.
She usually has a corn or blueberry muffin for me, as well. I get those for Maria. I admire her work ethic and conscientiousness. If she does something, she means to do it right. And I get her wry and dry sense of humor, you see it in the photographs. The camera likes Amy and her wagon.
She winces when I pull out the camera, but I tell her good people who work hard should be seen, not just nasty politicians eating each other – and us – up. I love the wry smile that a permanent fixture of Amy as if she is always shaking her head at the strangeness of the world.
My photos have helped me to understand who I admire and want to share with the people who follow my life. I am drawn to strong women who work hard and love what they do.
My life is more vibrant for Amy’s Country Kitchen, it binds me to the community, and brings me a bit into the farmer’s world, which I love. Rituals make up community and connection; they are essential to me.
In the not too distant future, there will be fewer and fewer family farmers in our town or any town.
At least they will eat well to the very end.