Livermore Farmers Market

Courtesy: Livermore Downtown Farmers Market Instagram

On any given Thursday between April and October you can head to Carnegie Park in downtown Livermore and observe people congregating over food and fresh produce. And if Thursday isn’t your day, you can experience this same phenomenon on 2nd street every Sunday throughout the year, minus a week or two for holidays.

I am not a religious person by any means, but I would be hard pressed to describe a holier scene than that of my local Livermore farmer’s market. The sizzling of meat on a hot surface mimicking the euphony of a choir. Vendors announcing their specials are reminiscent of a sporadic ‘Amen!’ from a church pew. Devout gastronomes praising at the altar of food trucks and depending on the season; tomatoes. Children laughing and people smiling at the simple pleasures of not only natures abundance but of those pursuing the American dream. To me the Livermore farmers market is my worship.

It’s true that you can buy almost anything you need from a grocery store but there’s something that the farmers market has that your big box supermarket doesn’t. It’s inviting. Theres something incredibly engaging about going outside and shopping for your produce. Sunshine instead of the terrible fluorescent lights. Fresh open air opposed to the filtered frigidness.

But is it so much more engaging because of the weather or is it something more?

Perhaps it is because it can also feel like a game. Theres nothing predictable about it. They may sell out of your favorite item. There could be new produce in season. There could be different products available. The possibilities and availability makes it exciting! The same way gambling gets your blood pumping so too can the risk of missing out on your favorite stone fruit or the restock of JTM’s chili oil.

Could its engagement also come from its live music? You can’t tell me that a shopping experience can’t be improved by a local artist singing your favorite throwback bangers. Al Green? Journey? Brown eyed girl? Theres nothing like live music that says come in and stay for a while.

Or could it be that every 3rd Thursday parents get to let their kids run wild while they grab a glass of wine or beer and finish their shopping in peace? Or moreover is it that markets are baked into our DNA? That our need to witness one another and be amongst one another is driven by a uniquely human quality.

Open air markets date back to ancient Egypt, and some argue Mesopotamia. To what extent these markets participated in a free market is neither here nor there, but the fact remains that we as humans have been making exchanges for goods for a very long time. But even before the advent of agriculture 10,000 years ago we were hunters and gatherers. Could we not make an argument that schlepping yourself across town to find parking, loading up your kids or your bags is not a practice in hunting and gathering? Could it be that the market is so exciting because it exercises those innately human instincts?

Or is that we have outgrown those instincts, and it is perhaps a newer instinct? While farmers market in the U.S. have a history dating back to the colonies, California’s farmers market is much newer. It is the product of war and labor disputes and has become a social necessity. But I think it has since transcended into something more. More than just local growers trying to move produce, more than just labor shortage. As of late it signals our need for community and acts as a place of connection.

Food has always been and will remain the great connector of people. I have never known someone whose bad mood couldn’t be improved by a tasty meal. It’s in our biology. Food enters the body, the body alerts the brain, and the brain releases all those happy hormones that make getting along with one another much easier.

Often it is hard to connect when we feel that we are different from one another but what better way to bridge differences than sharing one’s food, one’s labor. Seeing young children try foods from cultures other than their own warms my weary heart. I don’t think it is a stretch to say that experiencing someone’s culture through food at a young age makes ‘otherness’ smaller and makes ‘acceptance’ bigger.

So is its popularity and function a result of our new found social needs or is it an evolutionary leftover to make us feel like we are surviving?

Whatever the answer may be, the truth is that we love to gather. The farmers market offers us that opportunity with low pressure. Come as you are, stay as long as you want.

I often make a joke that our neighboring town isn’t even real, but I make this joke because it lacks a central place to gather. Any place that strives to create community needs a place to gather and in Livermore we create that place twice a week. No matter who we are, despite age, gender, orientation, good taste or bad taste, we all need to eat, gather, and connect. And what better place than our farmers’ market?

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