What is CSA?
Community Supported Agriculture is a popular, accessible, mutually beneficial agreement between community and farmer: Community pays for the year, at the beginning of the season, so Farmer can grow all these wonderful Plants from seed, cover start of the season costs, and share the abundance of stewardship with you, supporting members with a subscription service.
In 2025 and beyond we are facing hostile government take over including the freezing of funding for nearly all social services, including funding for farmers in existing contracts for climate safe practices and ecological stewardship, increasing access to nutritious food, and many rebellions against the big chemical agriculture complex that is poisoning waters, soils, peoples, pollinators, possibilities.
Our active engagement with civic processes, community care, mutual aid, land back, protecting and advocating for the human rights to safe drinking water, whole foods, preventative care, safe housing, bodily autonomy, appropriate working conditions, public road ways, climate response, disaster prevention and relief is more important than ever.
Supporting local food systems is highly actionable. It's more than a slogan or a bumper sticker or a tote bag. It is relational, dedicated, conflict resolving, showing up, investing money - time - curiosity - and all sorts of resources. And it's so deeply human.
An herbal CSA provides sustained nourishment for us all.
You will receive a care kit composed of Meraki grown plants in the various traditional forms people have been preserving and connecting with Plants and caring for all, for thousands of years.
You also get a BOOK written by Lu guiding you through the season, with Plants and Processes. This is part of the very unique offering that so many folks find so valuable.
Working with Meraki tools of care is particularly intimate, deeply rooted in the traditions of “land centered therapies, born from deep, intimate relationships, across generations” :
Generations of my family and collective ancestry,
generations of wisdom keepers and community health care providers,
generations of diaspora and starting over,
generations of stories and seeds, generations here on this formerly stripped land and the generations in your home and life.
Reorienting to this kind of long term, daily, habitual, informed, emerging relating restores connection. Restoring connection is an antidote to the disconnection we all experience in the modern era of technology, hostile government takeover, collective chronic stress and insecurity.
This MF CSA offering is a natural evolution of the paths Lu takes with Land, Plants, Communities of all kinds of critters. I tend to the Land so we can tend each other, a cycle of reciprocity, respect, and responsibility.
All things made here are grown, harvested, processed, formulated and packaged here - this is so important for so many reasons. This approach is again, deeply intimate. But this provides high quality plant material that is more effective because of The Plants being who they are, but being grown and tended with this kind of respect is part of why folks stay with MF.
Other implications include “resource use” - plastic, fossil fuels, packaging, time sitting on a warehouse shelf is time in the ground growing, transforming light and evolution into preventative care easily accessed and experienced by any body who wants it.
Why join MF CSA?
This is a unique program that responds to several barriers of care, and the sincere desire to Learn Herbalism through direct experience from a respected herbalist deep in practice.
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Accessibility — there are numerous obstacles to nutrient dense food, preventative care, lived experiences of safety and nourishment, and continuity of care - from seed to skin, from generation to generation, across urban - suburban - rural communities. Mutual investment of community and organic farmers re-orients us all to abundance, security and nourishment, increases access for preventative and responsive integrative care for people, and helps serve families across the country. . TLDR amazing plants arrive at your doorstep, grown because you support this work, from someone deeply dedicated to decreasing the violence including chronic illness in this country.
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Climate resilience - Supporting an organic, regenerative, bioregional herb farm keeps farmer Lu in deep intimacy with the Land, repairing damage from mining and extraction, re-establishing native habitat and food source for pollinators and animals, reduces soil erosion and compaction, and provides an inspiring example of stewardship in a geographical region that is profoundly impacted from exploitative, disruptive prior land use. Keeping these gardens growing increases seed sovereignty, continues the work of responding to climate change in real time, data collection, mastering methodology, and of course sharing everything learned with the community. TLDR: it's imperative to support as many stewards as you possibly can.
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Centering Respect, Reciprocity, Responsibility - Becoming a member of the MF CSA deepens our relationship: MF is a community herbal farm and practice completely interdependent on community engagement and support. There are no other sources of funding for all the labors of sowing - stewarding - harvesting - processing - formulating - labeling - packaging - educating - leading - marketing - newsletter writing - content creating - public speaking - consulting done by Lucia Hawkins. Your active participation is required for these powerful services to continue, without decreasing accessibility, and never compromising on the standards and ethics of practice. TLDR: without your reciprocity and shared responsibility, I can’t do this.
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Mutual Surviving and Thriving - We know the existential threats facing all of us. We know influencers are trash, AI writes herbal books, and most folks don’t know who to trust and work with in regards to the whole spectrum of nutrition - relations with Land, with our bodies, with our communities. Supporting MF as a CSA member ensures the continued integrity, transparency, availability, and accountability that is essential to protecting folks from disinformation and violence, while increasing connections to that which sustains us. TLDR because there is a lot of absolute horseshit out there.
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Delicious Revolution - The Meraki way is rather unique in our era, and is a proud provider of potent experiences with Plants that are grown with so much love and reverence, since 2015. The CSA offerings are deeply informed by direct relations with the Plants, across the seasons, and provide high quality tools for your own centering respect, reciprocity, and revitalization. You will be enchanted, you will be in awe, you will have an enhanced relationship with your body, the bodies of Plants, and the bodies of what is possible, for us all. You will be nourished, through the year, with a lot of love from Lu and The Plants.
