Since World War II, writes Wendell Berry,  the governing agricultural doctrine in government offices, universities, and corporations has been that there are too many people on the farm, too few in rural America. Rural life has been abandoned in favor of  the new global economy.

Berry is correct.

One of the great and most consequential migrations in human history has been tens of millions of rural people moving from country to city in a stream, then a tidal wave. Towns and villages have emptied out, jobs have fled, development has decreased, government has lost interest and, as significantly, a way of life is vanishing.

People struggle to make a living here. There are just not enough customers to sustain too many things.

Every day I get letters in my Post Office Box (P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816) from people remembering their lives on the farms, the chickens walking around, a pet cow, mother and father out in the fields, a fierce sense of community, values of thrift, help for friends and neighbors, hard work.

They like to read my blog, they say, it reminds them of the other life. The kids write me as well, many hope to return to the country one day, they love seeing photographs of it.

In a sense people in rural communities are victims, but you will rarely hear them whine or complain about their lives.

People in rural areas rarely steal things, lock their doors, helicopter-parent their kids. They drink too much, smoke too much, drive too fast.

In rural life, people once had callings, not jobs. Kids look for jobs and walk to school and back, they take their goats and cows to 4-H clubs and county fairs and sleep next to them all week.

People stayed on farms because they loved farms, despite the grueling work and hours. People were farriers, shearers, woodsmen, carpenters, tradesmen, blacksmiths. They chose work they loved for people who cared about them. It was never an easy life, but it was often a meaningful life.

I don’t care to romanticize rural life, it is often difficult and can feel small-minded, petty, even incestuous.  It’s hard to find the food  you want, or see the latest movie. People resist change, they are wary of it . The Internet brings the world closer when it seems far away. Once in awhile, I need to get to a city and soak up some energy.

Everybody minds their own business but everybody also know’s everybody’s business. Once this would have bothered me greatly, but now, I like to be known. And I am, if I forget my wallet or don’t  have enough money, the answer is always the same: “we know where you live.” When there is trouble – an animal dies, a tree falls on a fence, the pump to the well shorts out, the big men in trucks come running.

They are the First Responders of rural life, and they are always eager to help.  Being a neighbor still means something, we may or may not like each other, but we need to get along.

When there is serious trouble – an illness or a death – then everybody comes running,  male and female, the yard fills with cars and trucks and people bringing food and love. I never feel alone here.

I am a creature of urban life – I grew up in Providence, R.I., and lived in Baltimore, New York City, Dallas, Washington and Boston. and suburban New Jersey. I could never go back, it seems that nobody ever does.

I feel as if Cambridge, N.Y. and the countryside is my home. I find the country to be healthy for me, and for others. Scientists say the brain is hard-wired for the peacefulness of rural life. . I like looking at beautiful things, I love the sense of space. I love big cities, but I can’t handle them for too long.

Too crowded, too noisy, too disconnected from one another.

I was struck in the early days of the Craig Mosher story in Vermont how many anguished Vermonters send me messages saying the indictment of their neighbor violated “Vermont values.” I wrote back to some of them and asked them what those values were.

“We don’t sue each other,” one man said. “We are always there for our neighbors,” said another. “In rural life, accidents happen, all the time, cows are always out on the road. You don’t go to jail for that, you go and help them out.” In Vermont, said another “we know the difference between pets and animals, we know what it is like to farm, we understand rural life.”

In a curious sense, the aftermath of Hurricane Irene embodied the very idea of Vermont Values. People did not want for government relief or handouts or guardsmen or outside contractors.  Just across the border, in New York State, people waited weeks to be dug out and get some help.

We know who one another’s kids are, if their bikes get a flat or they are getting soaked in a storm, it’s okay to give them a lift home. They know who we are. They know where we live.

In Vermont, everybody got into their tractors and trucks and went to work,  clearing out roads, changing riverbeds, rescuing one another, getting the elderly their medicine. It  was one of the great civic rescue operations in American history. Yet Vermont is also a culture divided, half of the state belongs to out-of-towners with different values and sensibilities. Sometimes they class, and perhaps that reality underlies the Mosher case.

The couple that hit the bull was from Connecticut and only lived in Vermont part-time. People whisper that Vermonters would never get one another arrested, unless it was for murder. It’s just what they say.

Everywhere, and not just in Vermont, people in rural areas feel that they are under siege. Their children almost all go off to cities to work in jobs they hate for people who care nothing for them.  Some of the old farmers go off to Florida to retire when their knees give out. Word is, they don’t last long down there with no cows to milk or fields to plow.

There is no one left to help the old-timers work on the farms, the term family farm is losing its meaning. Even if they could keep up with the giant corporate monoliths taking over food production and agriculture, time is running out for them.

Rural life is precious to me, we are close to nature here, beautiful things are all around us, we can still live and work with and around animals, we can get to know them as people have known animals for many thousands of years. Our dogs can run free and even go to the dentist with us, when my dog was lame, the vet stopped over to take a look at him running.

The winters are harsh, they have meaning. The Springs are eternally beautiful. Old people hang on to their houses, there is always someone to help.  To me, life seems more natural, less artificial. In the cities, people are piled on top of one another, but nobody seems to feel known.

I believe my creativity is enmeshed with where I live, I am inspired by the beauty and life and space all around me. I feel I am giving voice to people and a life that has been forgotten by the rich and the powerful who run the country. I am surrounded by good and  honest and plain-speaking people.

My dogs have never walked on leashes, they can come to the dentist with me or go to the bookstore here. Nobody in my town will break a car window if a dog is inside they think it’s warm. They might roll the windows down a bit.

This morning, Ed Watkins, who painted out house, came by to reassure me that he would bring over the cord of wood he promised, and that he owes me. “I’m not worried,” I said, “we know where you lived.” And Wally Cordell the plumber called to check on our well pump, which sounds funny. He is coming out in the morning.

“We live just north of Cambridge,” I said.

“I know where you live,” he said, “that’s Florence Walrath’s old place. You have the donkeys and the sheep there. I drive by all the time.”

I know that this way of life is dying, we all too. We don’t talk about it much, we just shake our heads at the news, at the cost of living in the city, at the complications and stress of life beyond our forgotten borders.

But everybody knows where I live. I live in Florence Walrath’s old place.