I miss having goats on the farm. As annoying as it was to wake up each morning to milk, it was a labor of love.

Jiro Dreams of Sushi, a documentary about the world famous sushi chef in Japan, made waves in the food world last year with its high definition celebration of the tiny basement level restaurant and their impeccable selection and treatment of the most appetizing seafood imaginable. Jiro continues to make his name serving what is thought to be one of the most expensive meals on earth, which is calculated partly by the length of the meal that often lasts less than 20 minutes as simple dish after dish is prepared in rapid succession, almost immediately after the last is consumed.

I am eight years old. My father, my brother Andrew and I board a large fishing boat in Menemsha. We have packed sandwiches and bananas for lunch.

My first cousin Nathaniel and I used to spend every waking hour together in the summertime. Our mornings were at the Chilmark Community Center running after perfect spirals from the Rev. John Taylor on the football field. Players were encouraged to be barefoot and the game was not over until the noon whistle was no longer audible to our eagerly searching ears.

My father and I went to the Turkish baths in the East Village of Manhattan this past February, our first time together in a city that has influenced my life almost as much as he has. The sun was shining brightly, the temperature hovered in the high thirties while the wind blew briskly down city blocks and flung itself around corners, stopping us occasionally in our tracks as we meandered south after exiting the subway. A short flight of marble stairs led us into the baths.

I have had more failures and mishaps learning to farm than most. My tendency to be cheap and, at times, careless has proven costly more often than not. In California, on a winery where we were also raising food, three heritage breed piglets were purchased from a breeder on the coast for more money than I would like to admit. They were brought back to their new home, and housed in a small makeshift pen meant to be a temporary home while we constructed a more permanent place for them behind a large storage facility.