As far as the farm is concerned, it's probably the single biggest reason I own a restaurant today, and the reason I became the person I am.  As a child I always felt I could do whatever I wanted.  My parents didn't pressure me into working at the farm doing chores and the like; I was just able to be a kid.  Through that time I absorbed so much about the life my parents were creating without any pressure for me to do the same.  

Looking back on my childhood I was totally spoiled.  My mom giving us all haircuts, the "hand me down" clothes, used cars, wood heated hot water (not always hot!), drafty imperfect house, lawn full of dandelions, stinky compost buckets.  As a child these things became ingrained in me as to what happiness is.  To this day, the smell of compost, or fresh manure brings a smile to my face.  Maybe if I had really known how "the other half" lived I would have been jealous, but I doubt it.  I probably did know, but somehow I knew my parents were different, and that I was happy and loved.

I still joke today, that if I had a choice I'd give it all up to go back to those days, and not just because my mom did my laundry!  It takes a lot of hard work to run a farm, while providing the same basic needs everybody else expects in life.  There was never a sense that it was too much for them, maybe a wish that there was more time in the day, but they grew and prepared food with a passion that has rubbed off a lot on me.  Today I continue to work towards my ultimate dream of owning and operating a self-sustained restaurant.  This dream needs that farm, and luckily I was given the foundations of life on it's land, and by my parents, to continue the pursuit of happiness.