- Publication Date : April 1, 2022
Being There
Bookmarking ASCFG President Val Schirmer’s remarks at the beginning of this issue, I’ll add my thoughts on the value of meeting colleagues face to face after two years.
The members of the ASCFG Board of Directors who were able to meet in New Orleans this February were pleased to be together on several counts; for many of us, that included being able to step outside without first pulling on wool mittens to shovel the sidewalk.
Most importantly, of course, is the sense of camaraderie, forged after eight straight hours around a meeting table, which renewed and strengthened this Board’s intent to serve ASCFG members. You just don’t get that same sense of purpose from a Zoom meeting, no matter how well intended are the participants. Even well-crafted emails, or files easily accessed in a Google drive, don’t provide the immediacy, and the easy back-and-forth that organizations like ours thrive on.
This sense of tangible accomplishment also lends itself to my perception of the twelve Farm Tours scheduled for this summer, and the grower conference that will be held in Framingham, Massachusetts in August.
Organizing events like these, with innumerable details to be confirmed, and reconfirmed, require countless hours, and constant and accurate communication. The difference is that at the end of the day, you can look back at your day and realize that you’ve created something that will soon benefit, and be appreciated by, hundreds of cut flower growers.
The manifestation of the ASCFG’s intent to educate and unite cut flower growers is never more evident, more tangible, than during a tour of a cut flower farm in Ohio, or between speaker sessions at a conference in Massachusetts. It’s a fulfillment that’s been missed the last two years, and we’re looking forward to making it happen for all of you in 2022.
