Red, White and TRUE BLUE
By Anna Austin, True Blue Farm owner
It was a little more than 5 months ago when my husband and I set off with our 4 kids across the country to pursue our idea of the American Dream - to build a farm and raise our own food on our own land.
If you’re reading this after it was first published, or if you’re not quite sure what 5+ months ago was, let me fill you in….
We drove our family from the lush Willamette Valley of Oregon across the entire country to the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee in February of 2021, during a global pandemic, and in the middle of a monster ICE STORM that reached its frozen fingers all the way down into Texas and covered the majority of the United States in an icy freeze.
It was surreal! My husband, Mark, drove a 26 foot long Uhaul truck with a horse trailer hauling his grandfather’s 1950 cherry red Massy Ferguson tractor on the hitch. I drove our F150, packed plum full of essentials like food and water, overnight necessities… and KIDS.
We kind of looked like a circus. And it for sure felt like one. Nevertheless, we set off in search of a life that we would be proud to live. One that would allow us to stand tall knowing that we were living a life authentic to who we are.
See, Mark has always felt a bent toward all things agriculture. He planted his first garden on the side of his parent’s house when he was just 7 years old, and woke up early every morning on his own just so he could water it. What kind of 7 year old boy has that kind of patience?!
During highschool he was active in the FFA (Future Farmers of America) and went to work on a grass seed farm right around the same time he graduated. Which was when I met him.
Life hit us fast, though. Maybe our hormones did, too. We welcomed a baby and had a wedding a couple months after high school, still just 18 years old. We had a few more babies in just a few years. Mark’s dream of farming, and mine of songwriting, quickly faded beneath the sound of baby cries and a clock-in/clock-out machine.
We were a part of “The System” now. The vague cultural system that tells you when to work and where to go, what to eat and what to wear. “The System” that keeps you under its thumb, constantly giving you just enough to keep you coming back, and never enough to actually set you free.
Even though we were very young and started off with nothing but a crisis, we had good friends and family that helped us along our journey. The odds that were stacked against us were no match for the team that Mark and I made together and the safety net of people that surrounded us. We never would have made it through our beginning years if it hadn’t been for them. Plus, God made provisions for us time and time again. He opened doors for us and put us around people that were a thousand times wiser than us. Subsequently, we did very well with what little we were given.
By the time we were 27 years old, we had a glowing family of 6, had owned and sold a few homes and were able to purchase a 3 acre property from Mark’s grandmother with a quaint farmhouse that had been in the family for 60 years. Mark had a good paying job. I stayed home with the kids. And we had a very beautiful life.
Now, you may be wondering, “Didn’t she just say they were moving across the country?? It sounds like they had the kind of life that almost everyone in America dreams about! Small acreage with a family farmhouse on the outskirts of town; a husband that pays the bills, and a wife that tends to the home and children.”
Charming, isn’t it??
But this wasn’t “it.”
This wasn’t the life we were supposed to be living.
I knew it.
Mark knew it.
And it ate us up from the inside out.
It was too safe. Too comfortable.
Charming, not thrilling.
It wasn’t truly authentic to who we were.
I knew what it was like to live an inauthentic life. To appear one way in front of people and to live differently when they weren’t looking. I knew what it was like to wear a scarlet letter, exposing my secret life right in front of me. I also knew what it was like to try and become someone that I wasn’t meant to be. To adjust myself to make others happy. To people please. And I didn’t want to live that way anymore. Mark didn’t either.
And yet, there we were, living a beautiful life we knew wasn’t authentically us, faced with the decision to either stay safe in “The System,” with only the illusion of our American dream, or, to break free and become true American Pioneers, blazing a trail to a new life that was screaming for us to come and discover it.
It took us a while — 4 years to be exact — to conjure up the courage. But we finally did it! We told our friends and family what we were about to do, and we set off together on a quest to live our authentic life. A life of integrity, honesty, bravery, and courage navigating unknown territory, to discover the place where we truly belong.
The story is long of how we got to the exact property we’re at now here in Tennessee. Let me just say that “difficult” is an understatement for the journey that it was. There were twists and turns every step of the way. Not to mention a fire that ate up thousands of acres in Oregon and taunted our former home with its orange shadow for weeks (just as we were preparing for the move!), AND a failed transaction that left us losing our first contract in Tennessee.
But let me tell you what we have discovered on the other side of our courage. We have discovered ourselves.
Mark is like that little 7 year old boy again, sowing his gardening seeds and waking up early to watch them grow. And I am just down the road from my Nashville area songwriting friends.
Our farm looks like this: 52 acres in the middle of nowhere, Tennessee. There are 3 ponds and a creek. It’s all fenced and there are 8 barns on the property. We currently have 2 ducks, 3 cats, 3 dogs, 3 pigs, 5 cows, 8 sheep, 22 laying hens, and 100 meat chickens. We even managed to get a garden in the ground and by God’s grace, it actually produced some food for us this year!
I can’t believe that THIS was what was waiting for us on the other side of what we thought was our American Dream before. We realize now it was a “safe” illusion. This is THE REAL DEAL. The real us. We just had to fight to get to it. It took courage and bravery and a burning desire to be the people God made us to be.
It is more work than we’ve ever done in our lives. I never imagined we would be up at 5am hauling buckets of water to our thirsty chickens, or shoveling feed to the cows before having our morning coffee. But we KNOW that this is the life we are supposed to live. Sweaty and tired and a bit uncomfortable... It doesn’t matter. THIS is what we are supposed to be doing! It’s hard. It’s thrilling. It’s authentic to who we are and we know that we know it is what we were called to do.
We recently registered our farm with the state of Tennessee. We want to do this farming thing right and well- truly ALL IN. Can I tell you what we named the farm? TRUE BLUE FARM.
On her deathbed, Mark’s grandmother whispered under her breath when Mark walked in to say his last goodbye to her. “Oh, Markie? ...he’s true blue.”
This is how we will honor God and our family and our community. By living True Blue lives. We grow good, honest, True Blue food, and we live authentically as the people God created us to be, living the REAL DEAL American Dream. Red, White, and TRUE BLUE.
Is there an area of your life that you know you are not living authentically? Do you want to be True Blue, too? I hope my story brings you some courage today. It may be hard. It may be uncomfortable. But rising to the challenge of being the person God made you to be is WORTH IT. You can do it!
Anna’s True Blue tips: Living an authentic life
Decide what is most important to you. What do you feel like God has called you to do? What is your highest priority? Don’t just say it — start taking steps to make it y our TRUE priority.
Get out of debt and stay out of debt. the Bible says “the borrower is slave to the lender” (Proverbs 22:7). We are not FREE to do what God has called us to do when we are a slave to financial debt.
Consider whether what you’re doing is LIFE GIVING. I recently read a quote that said something like, “Burnt out? It is highly unlikely that you are doing too much with your life.; you’re probably doing too little — too little of what gives you life.”
Be honest. ALWAYS. It is so common in our culture to embellish our lives and our stories to make us look better than we are. True Blue authenticity is being honest.
Live with integrity. Keeping your promises, being true to your word — and true to God’s Word — are essential, in my opinion, to being True Blue. It is being the same person behind closed doors that you show people in public.
“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as though you were working for the Lord and not for people.” - Colossians 3:23
About Anna Austin
Anna Austin and her husband, Mark, have embarked on a “True Blue” journey with their four children. Moving from the Pacific Northwest to a rural Tennessee homestead they’ve named True Blue Farm, they are pioneering a new dream of renovating their historic (circa 1900) farmhouse and living the farm life. Anna puts her whole heart into everything she does, whether it’s homeschooling their 4 kids, writing and singing worship songs, or helping grow the garden while raising the animals on the farm. Making art is Anna’s favorite hobby, along with spotting 4 leaf clovers! Follow the Austin Homestead YouTube channel to check out their farm life adventures. Follow Anna’s music on her music Facebook page, and her True Blue life happenings on Instagram.