At 4:50 p.m., the gofundme project for Carol and Ed Gulley was $11,945, already nearly $2,000 over the goal of $1,000. And we can keep going, hopefully all the way to $50,000. The original goal was $10,000 but that was passed Sunday. I want you to know that the money is not for toys, or for some fun.

This afternoon, the goal was raised to $25,000, that is good news. I believe Ed and Carol will need at least $50,000 to do what they want and need to do, and so I am going to keep pushing for that amount.

Ed has a cancerous series of tumors in his brain, it is an aggressive tumor and inoperable. He has refused chemotherapy or exploratory surgeries. He would love to go to Montana with his wife Carol, but they will also have many serious medical and other needs. Whatever happens down the road, Ed is sure to need extensive medical care and support.

I know the Gulleys well, and they are hard-working farmers who have spent their loves outdoors, fixing tractors, pulling calves out of cows, milking and loving animals. They are good people for whom our society does not any longer provide much support when the bottom falls out.

The farmers like to talk about their bucket lists, and some people like to talk about the gofundme project as money for such a list.

A bucket list gives a person a purpose in life. It’s something you know you want to do. It gives you goals to reach for, something to get out of life. Ed does not know how much life he has left to get out of. He could find a miraculous cure, he could not. No one can say.

And there is so much he needs to do – care for himself, support his children, who are taking over the farm, get his house fixed up and ready for Carol if he does not recover or can’t do the work himself. His “bucket list” is about a lot more than a trip to Montana.

Farmers have fed us well all of our lives, we are the best fed people on the earth, but we are not grateful, our bellies are too full. Milk prices are the same as they were in 1970. Ed is an iconic farmer, one of the last of a dying breed.

He has not gone corporate, but kept his family farm small enough to feed his family, and small enough to know each cow by name, and love his animals as he loves his children. He says his cows are his best friend.

I think of Ed when I read Wendell Berry, a famous writer, environmentalist, poet and chronicler of the farm.

” A competent farmer,” he writes, “is his own boss. He has learned the disciplines necessary to go ahead on his own, as  required by economic obligation, loyalty to his place, pride in his work. His workdays require the use of long experience and practiced judgment, for the failures of which he knows that he will suffer.  His days to not begin and end by rule, but in response to necessity, interest, and obligation.  They are not measured by the clock, but by the task and his endurance; they last as long as necessary or as long as he can work, and his endurance.  He has mastered intricate formal patterns in ordering his work within the overlapping cycles – human and natural, controllable and uncontrollable – of the life of a farm.”

Ed is a more than competent farmer. For decades, along with his wife Carol, taken care of his four children, his cows, his farm, his land. I believe he is deserving of our support.

As he fights for his life, the welfare of his family, the future of his farm, and his own remaining goals in life, I hope we can continue to support him and move towards $50,000, which is what I believe he will need. He has some tractors to repair and replace, some insulation to install, some roofing work to finish.

Farmers and others are rushing to his side, people from all over, doing all kinds of work.

And yes, he means to get to Montana with his wife to see the beautiful mountains he has always dreampt about. You can contribute to the fund here.