Blogs

When we were pregnant with our first daughter, people always said, “It takes a village to raise a baby.” If you’ve never had kids, you might not realize that maxim is definitely true. Even if you don’t have kids, having and running a farm is really similar.

Four burned-out vehicles. Three men hospitalized. Bats and axe handles lying in the mud. A dead dog.

The aftermath looked apocalyptic at Anthony McGann’s farm in rural Ireland. Or the stuff of old westerns.

It was a magnificent house with all the trappings of grandeur: marble pillars, spiral staircases and stained-glass windows. Passersby and foreigners always bowed their heads, crossed themselves or just smiled with reverent respect, as if they were passing a church.

New Year’s resolutions made a few months ago may seem like distant memories, after the fierce and what seemed like a never-ending winter we are just now emerging from.

We all need people. Without other people, there would be no market for the large quantities of high-quality food we produce. Without people, it would also be nearly impossible to produce all that food, process it and get it delivered all over the world. We need people, and for many more reasons than just to help us produce and consume our product.

Editor’s note: This is the first in a series of blogs Rebecca Shaw will be providing about female entrepreneurs and what the dairy industry can learn from them.

“My best successes came on the heels of failures.”