GRAND OPENING MARCH 1, 2023

   I gave the fruit market a Christmas gift this year—bought one of those E-photo frames and loaded it with a fraction of my zillions of pictures of hot peppers, raspberries, Christmas trees, hanging baskets, farmland, pumpkins and YFM staff. My hope is that Matias can connect it to our big screen TV at the market and it can scroll through the photos for all to see.
   It takes me down memory lane, and tells part of the YFM story. I threw in a few “behind the scenes” photos that will only be special to those of us who are behind-the-scenes, but my hope in all the communications I do for the market is that I lift the veil just a little bit and give our customers a behind-the-scenes glimpse.
   A lot of it is too private to share, a lot of it is joyful, some of it is heavy with sorrow, some of it is hilarious and some of it is just…mystifying, but it’s all part of the beautiful experience we’ve had when we put on green aprons.
   Mystifying, indeed, was one customer’s angry reaction to this sign:
                      

            

(Everything on our walls had to come down for painting this week and is all jumbled in heaps in the    office including this sign)

   This sign deserves its backstory to be shared, so here goes. When Sound Transit was planning on gobbling up our property to add a bus lane, we were overwhelmed and out-witted. Struggling to find our footing, we hired an attorney who specialized in eminent domain. He flat-out told us to give up, because what Sound Transit wants, Sound Transit gets, end of story.
   That was a bitter pill to swallow, and we knew we couldn’t come to work every day and tell customers that we were at the end of our run, so we had to keep a glimmer of hope alive that somehow, some way, we could prevail. We went down a lot of dead-ends, chasing fruitless solutions, but along the way a marvelous, wonderful thing happened and people began coming out of the woodwork offering help: an architect, an engineer, others who’d battled Sound Transit’s plans for their property, journalists, customers beyond counting.
   One day I went to the post office to pick up our mail, stood at the sorting table and opened a hand-addressed letter. Out fluttered a check for one thousand dollars.
   It came from a Seattle business owner who had faced similar land-use battles. Her case had made local media as well, and was a David vs Goliath story. While she was in the thick of her battle, an unsolicited check came to her for one thousand dollars from an Eastern WA apple grower. She didn’t know this man, but he’d read about her battle and was moved to help fund her fight. She tried to refuse the money; he insisted. She told him she’d pass it on to the next business she felt was fighting an uphill battle.
    I burst into tears right there in the Bothell P.O. It was a long, hard slog, but as our customers know, Sound Transit eventually decided that the highway didn’t need to be 7 lanes wide with a planting strip running down the middle in order for a bus to drive on it. We’ll never really know the actual reason for their decision, but I have no doubt that the TEN THOUSAND postcards our customers sent to ST played a role. In the end, I think it was a perfect storm of several factors. But that’s another story.
   Anyway, long-story-long, once the pandemic eased up we were able to visit the Seattle business owner who’d given us the thousand dollars. To my delight, she was a passionate and compassionate, whip smart, practical minded, trail-blazing idealist. A role model if ever there was one.
   It was clear that she was a people -loving patriot, who wants our country to live up to its stated ideals of liberty and justice for all. To that end, she created a business that helped others turn their dreams into reality. No handouts from the government for her to do this, no non-profit status. Just hard work and a sharp eye. One of her slogans was “hate has no place here.” In her phrase, I hear vibrations of “Love one another as I have loved you,” so it resonated.
   We wanted to give her a gift, and had a sign made with her phrase, and we made one for the market as well. Most customers probably never even notice it, but then again, we made an image of the sign into a greeting card, and it’s one of our more popular cards. However, last fall my husband opened a hand-delivered, several-page screed from an angry customer. Knowing that I’d be hurt by the letter, dear husband shredded it and didn’t tell me about it until much later. The customer vowed never to set foot in the market again because of that sign.
   The letter was anonymous, so no way to have a rapprochement with the writer. These times we’re living in are prickly and challenging to navigate. I don’t seek controversy, and I’m sure not out to offend people. Perhaps “hate has no place here” is strongly worded, but to me it’s a clear statement of community values.
   As we prepare for the market’s 85th season and our family’s 52nd year of ownership, I’m overwhelmed with gratitude: that this little market survived 85 years, for ALL the people who’ve crossed our path, that the market has given us such a wide diversity of experience, surrounded all the while by freshness, color, beauty and bounty—and all of it highly perishable, making it plain that everything, everyone will eventually…evanesce.
  Grand opening is Wednesday, March 1 at 6 a.m. Let’s appreciate each other and everything that comprises the “it” of our experiences, together, in 2023. You know where to find us!

Fruitfully yours,

Karin

*Do not offend others as you would not want to be offended.—Buddhism

*None of you are true believers until you love for your brother what you love for yourself.—Islam

*What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor.—Judaism

*I am a stranger to no one and no one is a stranger to me. Indeed, I am a friend to all.—Sikhism

*Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.—The Golden Rule