Editors' Notebook

Farmers beware. Oprah is claiming your job title.

In the June 2013 issue of her magazine, O -- The Oprah Magazine, Oprah's lead story is titled "Oprah's New Farm!" The cover features a happy and smiling Oprah standing next to a happy and smiling Bob Greene (her weight loss guru) who is holding a rake instead of a pitchfork. An American Gothic for those who might not know a hoe would be of more use?

I have a wee problem with Oprah. I like her, I guess, as a person, although I don't personally know her. Not her fault, she bares her soul all the time; I'm just not taking the time to listen or read, I guess. I don't buy her magazine. It features $300 pairs of shoes and $400 purses. That's a bit out of my price range. Plus, there's a lot of talk about spending time on yourself -- much easier to do when you can pay others to do the laundry, scrub the floors, take care of the lawn, walk the dog, cook the meals, etc. You get my drift.

However, my best friend from college is a magazine glutton. She buys all kinds of magazines from Half Price Books for about $1 an issue. Then she passes them on to me. I'm reading O -- The Oprah Magazine, second hand. Story of my life. My husband was engaged to someone else when I met him. But that's another tale.

Oprah owns property in Maui, Hawaii, among other places. She has designated 16 acres for farming and last summer planted a single acre with fruits, vegetables and herbs. She's "discovered" natural fertilizers, compost, cover crops and plant rotation. She reports her farm is already producing 145 pounds of food each week. They are still exploring the best way to distribute that food, but Oprah claims for now she walks down the road giving away bags of lettuce.

Oh boy. I'm not sure I believe that. Maybe it happened once.

First of all, what ever happened to the term "gardener?" In my mind, Oprah is a "gardener" and she has a "garden," not a farm. To be a farmer requires that your livelihood comes from the farm. Oprah's livelihood comes from a lot of different sources, but her garden certainly isn't one. I hope in the end she GIVES away the food grown in her garden. Local schools, homeless shelters, food banks should benefit from her gardening discoveries. She certainly doesn't need the income that would be gained from selling the produce.

Second, I see in the article a sidebar with tips from a man described as an herb gardener on Oprah's farm. Hmmm ... so a man who does the actual work is called a "gardener" but Oprah is a "farmer?" Hmmmm, again. My lips are vibrating from all this judgmental hmmmmmming.

Third, words, names and titles are important. Don't let them be devalued. Oprah certainly knows the value of her name. Although everybody with a cell phone, internet access and a blog may think of themselves as a "reporter," I certainly don't. As I said the other day, "I have been in medical offices many times, but that don't make me a doctor."

Don't let Oprah claim the title "farmer." It's important that farmers retain the incredible brightness of being farmers, with all the connotations the word contains, good or bad, depending upon who is doing the perceiving. If anybody who grows some food for themselves or their neighbors in their backyards is a farmer, then I guess we are all car mechanics (I've changed oil), seamstresses (I can sew on buttons), carpenters (I have pounded a nail) and doctors (I prescribe treatments and dispense them with abandon. Nyquil, anyone?).

Yet, I don't call myself any of these things. I would never disrespect someone else's profession by claiming to "own" it without putting in the years of sweat, toil and education it takes to earn said title.

(Side note -- "own" in that previous sentence is a clever in-joke because Oprah's television network is named OWN -- The Oprah Winfrey Network. I'm pretty proud of that little word play. Dare I claim the title "writer?" Not yet, not yet. But maybe someday.)

Some may think this whole thing is nothing to get worked up about. Don't forget Oprah's go-round with the beef industry. In 1996 when Oprah hosted a segment on mad cow disease and the beef industry, swearing off hamburger in the process, beef prices plunged for weeks after the episode. Now, I'm not a market analyst, so I can't say specifically what caused the drop in prices at that time. But if it walks like an Oprah and it squawks like an Oprah, it might just be an Oprah.

Still, I find this interesting. A quick internet search for "Oprah" and "beef" turned up a recipe for beef meatballs from the March 2012 issue of "O -- The Oprah Magazine." The first ingredient is two pounds of ground beef. That's hamburger in my neck of the woods.

So I suppose if Oprah didn't stop eating hamburger forever, she just might not be a farmer forever, too. I, for one, will certainly never bestow that title on her.

As usual, if you'd like to join my email group of readers/subscribers whom I contact regularly for opinions, please drop me an email at cheri.zagurski@telventdtn.com.

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