by Ruth Ozeki
Why couldn’t I have done that?
The paper trembled in my father’s hand. “My friends,” he began, but even with the microphone working, you could barely hear him.
“Speak up, Lloyd!” someone yelled.
“My friends!” he repeated, loudly this time. “Mrs. Fuller and I welcome you.”
Momoko was sitting just offstage in a folding chair. Someone in the crowd started to clap, and then a few more joined in. Lloyd waited until the clapping stopped, then raised his paper.
“Now, I’m not a minister,” he read, and he broke off to look out over the audience. “I gotta say that,” he explained, “seeing as it’s Sunday and Reverend Glass is over there, and I don’t want him thinking I’m stealing his show. . . .”
He nodded to the pastor, who held up his palm as in a blessing. They were old friends, and the audience laughed.
“Where was I? Oh, yes. Now, I’m not a minister, and thank God I’m not a politician either, but today is Sunday, and it’s Independence Day, too, so I would like to take this time to reflect together on the place of faith, and government, and our Maker’s design.”
His reading voice was stilted and dry. I noticed a few of the young people rolling their eyes. Lloyd hesitated as though he had lost his place again, but instead of trying to find it, he just let the paper drop. The silence lengthened, and his head sank toward his chest like he was praying or falling asleep. Get him off, I thought, but the next moment he looked up again, straight out over the crowd. His eyes were clear, and when he spoke, his voice was strong.
“Mrs. Fuller and I have always assumed that whatever base corruptions man has inflicted upon nature, there were certain of our Maker’s laws, sacred and inviolable, that even man could not breach. In this assumption we have been sadly mistaken.”
I hadn’t seen him like this since I was a kid and he was giving a talk to the Young Potato Growers, or to the congregation at a church function, or to the Rotary Club. He used to be a part of things, an important man, and one of the most powerful in Power County. And now he had it back. His sentences began to unfurl, tracing the peaks and valleys of his conviction, and his sudden confidence was like the scent of his aftershave, bracing to my pride. I took a deep breath, remembering the feeling. Nothing could go wrong now, because Lloyd Fuller was my daddy, and I could rest secure in the fullness of his authority.
“It has come to my attention that in 1998 the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Delta & Pine Land Company, which is the largest cottonseed company in the world, announced that they had developed and received a patent for a new agricultural biotechnology that quite literally takes the breath of life right out of a seed. This patent permits its owners to create a sterile seed by cleverly programming a plant’s DNA to kill its own embryos. This technology, nicknamed the Terminator, can be applied to plants and seeds of all species, including food crops, thereby, and in one ungodly stroke, breaking the sacred cycle of life itself.”
Lloyd paused here and looked around. Everyone, young and old, was listening. “What good does this serve?” he asked the crowd. “To make a seed sterile? The answer is, no good whatsoever. Honest farmers, robbed of their God-given right to save their seed, will be forced to purchase these new, blasphemous contraptions every year from corporations that claim to control the patent on life.”
His voice tightened. “Corporations have words to make this sacrilege sound legitimate. They call it a ‘Technology Protection System.’ They claim it is necessary to protect their ‘investments,’ their ‘intellectual property rights,’ and their novel seed patents.”
He raised his hand in the air. “Mrs. Fuller and I say this: God holds the only patent! He is the Engineer Supreme! And He has given up His seeds into the public domain!”
He brought his fist down as though banging a gavel. The gesture was too much for him, and he tottered. When he regained his balance, he turned and called to Momoko, who shuffled forward to stand next to him. He took her hand, and they faced the crowd, and when he spoke again, his voice was gentle and matter-of-fact.
“Mrs. Fuller and I sell only open-pollinated seeds, which you can save and plant as you choose. You may think that this doesn’t make good ‘business sense’—that it would be better to force our customers to buy new seeds from us each year—and you’d be right. That’s the way of the corporations. But we’re not concerned with that.”
He swallowed, and I could see his bony Adam’s apple leap up his neck. He looked down at the top of Momoko’s head. “Our seeds contain our beliefs. That’s why we urge you to continue to save them and propagate them and pass them on to others to do the same, in accordance with God’s plan. In this way we chose to praise our Lord and to fulfill His design—of which mankind is just one small part.”
He bowed his head.
“Amen.”
He stood there gripping Momoko’s shoulder. People rose to their feet and started to clap. The applause went on and on. Geek walked over and stood beside them. He took the mike and held up his hand for silence.
“As Lloyd has reminded us, today is the Fourth of July—Independence Day—and we are assembled here to declare independence from the corporate hegemony that is seeking to gain total control over global food supplies. In the spirit of America, in the spirit of our forefathers and foremothers, who fought for independence from economic slavery and colonialist oppression, in the spirit of the Boston Tea Party, we hereby declare this the Idaho Potato Party!”
What happened next I will never remember clearly, although later I would go over it again and again in my mind, trying to sort it all out. All I could recall was a series of impressions:
Lloyd standing onstage with a foolish smile, clutching Momoko’s hand.
Geek raising his fist like a commander calling his troops to arms.
A television cameraman from the local news training his lens on them.
Frankie and Lilith and Melvin clambering onto the stage, wearing white protective suits and gloves and gas masks.
Ocean and Phoenix standing in the wings next to Lloyd’s empty wheelchair. Ocean was jumping up and down, and Phoenix was holding on to her.
Then Geek had a megaphone and was instructing the crowd to move toward the potato fields, toward Fuller West Four, just beyond the poplars. The TV crew followed, staying close to the white-suited Seeds.
Cass handed Poo back to me and took off running.
And that’s when I finally caught sight of Elliot. He stood to one side of the crowd, talking to a cop in uniform. When the cop moved off, I saw it was Billy Odell. Then I noticed the cruisers parked out along the road. Their lights were flashing.
I started toward Elliot, who was yelling at a man in mirrored sunglasses. Poo started to wail and wanted to get down. I held him tight and cut across the surge of the crowd. Dust hung thick in the air from all the feet. The man with the sunglasses turned his back, and Elliot saw me coming. He froze.
“Hi, Yummy.” His voice was oddly cheerful, but his eyes were like empty holes.
“What’s going on? What was the sheriff—”
But Elliot’s cell phone was ringing, and he held out his hand in front like a cop holding up traffic. “Hang on.” He flipped open the receiver to take the call. I heard him say, “A little bigger than I anticipated.”
Then he said, “The sheriff called in the state troopers. They’re standing by to—”
Then, “Well, we’ve got a citizen’s group. A busload of church people. The contact assures me they’ll speak on family values. I’m working on the farmer—”
And finally, “Of course, Duncan. But I’m just not comfortable—”
He listened for a while, staring but not seeing me at all, and then he snapped the phone shut. I watched as his eyes adjusted and I came back into focus.
“Yummy, I’m sorry,” he said. “Come to the motel tonight.”
“Elliot, what the fuck . . . ?”
“Please. It’s important. I want to explain.” He looked at m
e, and for a moment there was a door in his eyes that opened, leading back into a darkness that receded like a tunnel or a cave, but before I could see what was at the end, the door slammed shut and I heard his voice, faint now, coming from the other side.
“I’m sorry, Yumi,” he said. He pronounced my name correctly, and I thought that was strange. “I didn’t mean for things to turn out this way.”
Everything was happening in slow motion, like a careful dance or a ritual war or a nightmare. Several hundred people were filtering through the poplar windbreaks and milling around on the far side along the dirt road, where the state troopers were waiting. Their squad cars formed a road block around the edge of Fuller West Four, which belonged to Will Quinn now. I was running, trying to push through the crowd, but I didn’t know where I was going or why, certain of one thing only—that if there was going to be trouble, my kids would find the center of it.
A yellow school bus was parked just outside the police cordon. On one side hung a hand-painted banner, which read TRI-COUNTY INTERFAITH LEAGUE OF FAMILY VALUES. The man with the sunglasses was leaning against the bus, arms folded and watching. A picket line was starting to form, and placards were passed out to people as they got off the bus. I thought I recognized faces I had grown up with, members of the church and kids from my school. They were carrying signs: CLEAN UP LIBERTY FALLS! STOMP OUT PORNOGRAPHY! PROTECT OUR CHILDREN! THUS SAITH THE LORD . . .
I hugged Poo and pushed on, arriving at the edge of the field just in time to see Lloyd approach the sheriff. Lloyd was in a wheelchair, pushed by Melvin—or at least I thought it was Melvin, but it was hard to tell under the white suit and the gas mask. Phoenix and Ocean were tagging along.
“Billy Odell,” I heard Lloyd say, “you’re trespassing. I’m ordering you off my property.”
And just then Will Quinn stepped up beside Billy.
“I’m sorry, Lloyd,” he said. “This is my property now. Mine and Cassie’s. You’ve got no right to allow these people to damage my crop.”
“Let us through, Will,” Lloyd said. “We have an agreement, remember? I’m entitled to use this land while I’m still living.”
“Five acres of it. You’re off the edge right now.”
“Will Quinn, I sold you this land in good faith.”
“And we’ve been good neighbors for years, Lloyd. Don’t let these people make you forget that.”
But it was too late, because the Seeds, dressed in their white suits and led by Geek, had stepped between the patrol cars and onto the field. They were making their way down the rows, parting the leaves as they tore the NuLifes from the ground. The tubers were still tiny, dangling from thick stems. The Seeds held the plants over their heads and shook them, and the dirt rained down over their white protective garments. I heard Lilith’s shrill voice cry out.
“Liberate the farmers! Liberate the fields!”
Others picked up the chant, and a few dozen more people pressed forward.
“Liberty rises in Liberty Falls!”
The sheriff walked over with the chief of the state troopers.
“Well? What do you say, Will? They’re trespassing now. If we’re going to move, I’d say we do it soon, before they do too much more damage.”
Will didn’t answer. He watched the next wave of people move forward, uprooting plants as they went.
“This hurts me to see,” he said, sounding puzzled, but speaking to no one in particular. Cass stood next to him, staring at the destruction.
“We can’t let them get away with this,” said the sheriff. “We’ll have anarchy on our hands.”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Billy,” said Cass. “Relax, will you?”
The sheriff stiffened. “Pardon me, Cass, but this isn’t just about your crop. They’re breaking the law, and I don’t want precedents like this being set in my county.”
“They said they’d reimburse us,” Cass said. “It’s not like we’re going to be losing—”
The state trooper cut in. “That’s not the point, ma’am. We’ve got intelligence that they’re planning to move on the fertilizer plant in town later on, and I’ve got orders to treat this as an act of terrorism. We’ve got to send a message, loud and clear, or these punks will think they can get away with this kind of crap all over the state.” He turned to Will. “We’re going to have to move without you.”
Will nodded, then looked at his wife. “What they’re doing is wrong, Cass.” He shook his head. “I thought I’d feel angry, but it just hurts me to see. How can they be so disrespectful of all those plants?”
And while everyone pondered the answer to that question, my father made a break for it.
Melvin had eased Lloyd past the sheriff and had gone to join his comrades in the field, turning the wheelchair over to Phoenix, who stood at attention behind his grandfather, with Ocean by his side. Now Lloyd urged them forward. Phoenix threw his scrawny weight behind the chair and gave it a mighty push, sending it careening down the embankment into the soft dirt at the edge of the field. The wheels sank and embedded, refusing to budge, but Phoenix came around one side and Ocean came around the other, and together they pulled Lloyd out of the chair and onto his feet. He stood on the spongy ground, tottering, his balance uncertain at first, and then he took a step. The children braced him. The Seeds saw him and cheered. A TV cameraman spun around and dropped to his knees, filming Lloyd as he reached down and uprooted a NuLife, holding it in his fist, high in the air above his head.
He stared straight into the lens of the camera. “Liberate the farmers,” he croaked.
He looked unbelievable on the evening news that night. Standing there in the vast field with his fist raised against the blue sky, he shook the uprooted plant like a severed head, while his two grandchildren stood at his side.
“Tutu Lloyd, you’re awesome!” Phoenix said, eyes glued to the TV.
“Look!” Ocean cried. “There we are!”
“Shhh,” I said, trying to hear. The kids were ignoring me. Lloyd inched his wheelchair forward toward the television screen. I turned up the volume and listened.
“This land used to be mine,” Lloyd was proclaiming. “I would never have planted these ungodly abominations on my land.”
“You mean the potatoes?” the reporter asked.
“You can’t call them potatoes, because they aren’t,” Lloyd replied. “Government has them registered as pesticides. Hell, I don’t know what to call them. But I’ll tell you one thing: I pray to God my grandkids won’t have to grow up eating them!”
They showed a close-up of the potato plant and then a shot of Phoenix and Ocean helping Lloyd into the field.
Now, in the living room, Phoenix high-fived his grandpa.
“Yeah!” he said. “You tell ’em, Tutu man!”
Lloyd raised his palm to meet his grandson’s. He was clearly pleased, but his face looked gaunt and exhausted. I had tried to get him to go to bed earlier, promising to videotape the news for him, but he insisted on staying up to see it for himself.
On the screen Will was standing next to Cass with the potato fields stretching out behind them. The caption at the bottom of the screen read WILL QUINN, LIBERTY FALLS POTATO FARMER, FIELD OWNER.
“I believe in freedom of speech and the right to protest as much as any American,” Will was saying. “But this field is private property, and they got no right to trespass and undo all our hard work and interfere with my family’s livelihood.”
“His field. Ha!” Lloyd said. He sat back in his wheelchair. His color was rising. I looked at my watch.
“Dad? Don’t you want to lie down?”
He flapped his hand at me. I was an annoying fly, and all my concern for him was just so much buzzing.
On the television the police moved into the field to arrest the protesters, who resisted, letting their bodies go limp and falling to the ground. The police dragged them out through the dirt. I watched them cuff Geek’s hands behind him, throw Melvin up against the side of a squad car, a
nd stuff Lilith into the back of the paddy wagon. Momoko had joined Lloyd in the field by then. One of the sheriff’s men stood there cajoling them, but they refused to move. Charmey was the only one of the Seeds who was not wearing protective gear. Instead she wore a pretty sundress. She looked fragile and very pregnant, dragged by the armpits between a burly pair of cops.
And where had I been during all of this?
Scared witless, I’d entered the field, grabbed Phoenix and Ocean, and tried to haul them back to safety. It’s that old fear of the cops. Hang back. Stay clear. Disappear. Clutch Poo and swear to the others that if they dare to leave my side again, I will lock them in the root cellar for life. But of course they wouldn’t come. They were mortified—here it is, their moment of glory, and Mommy shows up. Panicking, I looked around for help. I saw Will talking to Odell. They were watching me and the kids. Odell shrugged, and Will spoke to Cass, then started toward us. He ignored me and addressed Phoenix. “You’ve made your point, son,” he said, taking hold of his arm. “Now come along.” In the face of that much authority, Phoenix’s determination wavered, and Will led us all back across the road, behind the cordon.
Now, in the living room, watching the replay of the arrests on TV, Phoenix glared at me. “I shoulda stayed with the Seeds,” he said. “I shoulda gotten arrested, too. Jail’s not so bad.”
Far better to be in jail than in the same house with your mother.
Just then Elliot’s face appeared on the screen.
“Shhh,” I said without meaning to, and the room fell silent.
“—like a modern-day witch hunt,” he was saying with a smooth and pleasant smile. “Hysterical muckraking and fear-mongering by people who don’t understand the careful science behind these technologies. These new crops are designed to minimize the environmental impact of some of the older farming methods, and as for the issue of human health, there’s absolutely no evidence to substantiate accusations that—”
