Whole Life Times: The Sexiest Guys on Earth

August 2006 | BackWords

The Sexiest Guys on Earth

Why going gaga for your local farmer is good for every body

by Lou Bendrick

Not too long ago, an old friend of mine from Los Angeles came to visit. I took her to a farm just a few miles from my house in western Massachusetts. I needed free-range eggs and I thought the city girl might enjoy a whiff, so to speak, of the country. Long story short: she loved the farm, so much so that she was willing to sacrifice a pair of lavender suede Ugg boots to the mud for a tour of the chickens, piglets and goats. The fact that my egg farmer is a good-looking guy might have been a factor.

“Wow,” she swooned when she got back to the car. “Those cheekbones.”

She’s not the first woman I know to swoon over this farmer. And he’s not the only farmer in my region who has been swooned over. What’s remarkable to me about all this swooning is that the swooners, most of them transplants from a big city, didn’t know a hen from a heifer a few years ago. And the swoonees? Less than a decade ago, farmers were relics from an agricultural past that seemed forgotten by everyone but real estate developers.

What changed things in my neck of the woods was sustainable agriculture. Farmers figured out that city folks want organic produce and city folks decided they wanted a greater connection to the source of their chemical-free and extremely tasty food. Today, farmers, urbanites and suburbanites mix it up at CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture farms), farmers’ markets, small organic farms and restaurants that support local growers. It’s not uncommon for moms here to plan playdates at farms—and I can tell you firsthand that spending an afternoon cavorting with a new litter of piglets is way more fun than languishing away the day inside at Gymboree. I once went to my egg farm, toddler in hand, to check out a batch of fuzzy chicks owned by the farmer with the wow-cheekbones. I noted with much amusement that another mom, a friend of mine, showed up with freshly styled hair and lipstick. Now I’m not suggesting that my friend wanted to star in her own version of Desperate Housewives. What I am saying is that a good-looking farmer adds a certain frisson to a play date or a grocery run. If you haven’t yet experienced this, you’ve been robbed.

And what’s not to love, really, about someone with practical, authentic skills in our era of technological ephemera? When the next batch of hurricanes hits and the oil wells run dry, whom do you want to wake up next to? Someone who can program HTML or someone who can help a cow give birth? Do you want someone with Bluetooth or someone with a tractor? How can someone who makes food out of dirt not impress you?

I’ll posit the theory that farmers are destined to become the next class of stars in American pop culture. Here’s why: A sexy farmer is the logical extension of the sexy chef and, as we all know, celebrity chefs rule the cable channels. We have a primal need to connect to food, and a farmer is one step closer to the source than a chef.
The farmer-as-celebrity trend is already happening in Europe where many trends, such as high gas prices, are set. England has an agricultural heartthrob, Jimmy Doherty, a hunky scientist-turned-hog-farmer who has his own BBC TV series and books. And where did Jimmy Doherty get his start? He happens to be a good mate of Naked Chef Jamie Oliver. Sexiness and food: it’s a combination as old as time. Just ask Adam and Eve.

If you still don’t believe me, take it from Jerry Miller, the rural matchmaker who started the website Farmersonly.com (motto: “City Folks Just Don’t Get It”). The site got so many hits last year that it crashed. Of the 20,000 singles who have posted profiles, five to 10 percent admit to being “farmer wannabes.” These urbanites may not get it, but they sure want it! Miller is amazed that this is happening in an era when farmers seem to get little mainstream respect.

“One of my clients told me, ‘This is amazing! You have city folks begging for acceptance,’” says Miller. For those of you who might be thinking of courting a farmer, check out the site first, lest you pull a Paris Hilton in The Simple Life. Forget all your city training and just “be yourself,” Miller advises. “Forget everything you’ve learned on TV in the past 20 years and go back to the Andy Griffith Show.” Not that farmers are backward: Miller estimates that half of all farmers are online.

I know it often seems as if we’ve crossed the Rubicon when it comes to the environment. Glaciers are calving faster than dairy cows, and the oceans may rise enough to actually burst the present farm-country real estate bubble. But there’s a bright spot in knowing a farmer well enough to think that he or she is kind of sexy. It means you know where your food comes from and how the animals that feed you are treated. The new breed of sustainable farmers treats the land and animals with gentleness and respect.

And—as even Paris Hilton would say—that’s hot.

Word slave Lou Bendrick would love to swap her word-processor for a plow.

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