Equal Time for Gay Farmers – The Bucolic Plague

I’ve been reading the LGBT magazine The Advocate for several years now. For the past year and a half or so, I’ve also been receiving (and sometimes reading) Out Magazine in conjunction with The Advocate. Somewhere on this site, I have a rant about the marriage of those two magazines but that’s not the point of today’s post.

Author Josh Kilmer-Purcell is a columnist for Out and a very frequent contributor/columnist for The Advocate. Though I don’t always entirely agree with his viewpoint – especially his very traditional gay male view of raising children (not) – I always read his contributions and I generally enjoy what he writes.

Yesterday, I blogged about lesbian author Catherine Friend and her book, Hit By a Farm: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Barn which documents the experiences of her and her partner as they started their farm with no previous farming experience between them. In the interest of equal time for the guys, I want to talk about two of Kilmer-Purcell’s recent efforts today that are similar to the experiences of Catherine Friend. Oddly, other than a column about his detest for gay males who wanted to be parents, the only other columns that are vivid in my memory from Josh are about the exploits, trials and tribulations of buying, owning and operating a “boutique” farm in upstate New York, The Beekman Farm.

Earlier this year, Josh’s third book, The Bucolic Plague: How Two Manhattanites Became Gentlemen Farmers: An Unconventional Memoir, was published. It’s a mostly true (some names have been changed and stories melded to protect the innocent…and Josh) account of the labors of he and his partner, Dr. Brent Ridge, establishing and operating their farm while maintaining their busy lives in New York City also and attempting to maintain their own relationship with each other. In 2010, a television series titled The Fabulous Beekman Boys starring Josh and Brent playing themselves aired its first season. Season two began in May. Season one is now out on DVD.

Kilmer-Purcell can turn a phrase and keep you laughing out loud but I would caution that his writing is not for everybody. He’s brutally honest when he calls things like he sees them. There’s nothing wrong with that but he can come off as brash and in your face at times.

Like Catherine Friend’s book, you won’t want to put this one down either. It’s a page turner. Unfortunately, due to my work schedule at my “real” job, I missed all but a couple of episodes of the television show…no, we don’t have a DVR because I’d never get anything done. I liked what I saw though and I hope the show continues to draw an audience and do well.