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MacLeans - Published June 2002

After years of struggle, it looked as if there'd be no more harvests (by: Eugene Warwaruk)

It was always a fight. It seemed every night a different creditor would call, and Dad would do his best to explain why he couldn't pay the bill. Crowded around the table, we ate supper silently, listening as he pleaded for more time. Then he would sink into his chair and try to muster the appetite to eat his cold food. I felt sick with despair, jumping when he snapped at Mom for having supper late again. Everyone knew that with seven kids to look after, it was a miracle anyone ate before 9 p.m.

The bank lent Dad tons of money to raise cattle through the 1970s on our farm near Erickson, Man. Feeding cattle was like playing the stock market. What was lost on one bunch was made up on the next. Then the market nose-dived - while Dad bought a big bunch of calves at $1.35 per pound. Selling at 72 cents per pound, we lost $110,000. That was 1981.

Every spring through the '80s, Dad somehow convinced the bank to give us another chance. By the time we got the money, the planting season was so late that the crop froze, so we would harvest the following spring, pushing that year back. And so the cycle continued.

Farmers need a deep reservoir of hope. Dad was no different. He looked forward to every harvest with a renewed sense of optimism. "Looks like a bumper crop this year," he'd say. "You'll see, this year's going to be different." My older brothers, Chris and Lawrence, and I had questions and doubts. Do I even want to farm? How can we buy fuel, or groceries? If you'd handled it this way, we wouldn't be in this mess. Everyone pointed fingers. Sometimes I wondered if I could last much longer in all the negativity.

Mom also had a deep reservoir of hope, but it was for her family and her marriage. The farm crisis took a terrible toll on two people already suffering from loneliness and lack of communication. Mom and Dad finally separated in 1989.

My youngest brother, Eric, fiercely independent, went off to university with his Governor General's Medal for academic excellence. Chris and Lawrence chose to stay, accepting that if they left, there would be no farm to come back to. As a middle child, I felt like I was the glue, keeping everyone together. I was painfully aware that if any of us got discouraged enough to quit, it would all be over.

In '93, it was all over. Almost. Buried under a mountainous debt, we faced an impossible decision. Too proud to give up and move on, we leased our land back from our lender, hoping to save up enough money to buy it back. We were allowed one five-year term to do it, with one three-year extension.

In the midst of all this, Lawrence, Chris and I made ends meet somehow. We worked together market gardening, picking small spruce trees and growing gourmet potatoes. That led to a concession trailer. We served burgers, fries and ice cream all over southern Manitoba in '97 and '98. Driving from festival to festival, we laughed and argued, schemed and reminisced. We were brothers, partners, confidants and best friends.

But by the fall of '98, with Eric finishing a film degree and me enrolled in a journalism course, we were all slowly drifting away, along with the hope of saving that farm. We, "the boys", needed a new project - and against all advice, decided to open a cafe in Winnipeg. Lawrence and Chris moved into the one-bedroom apartment Eric and I shared. The four of us worked feverishly for five months. Eric pulled out his Latin dictionary to find a name.

Luxsole Cafe opened in March, 1999. Meaning "Light from the Sun" (we had to add the accent on Sole so people would pronounce it properly), it was the perfect metaphor to connect our rural roots with the homemade food we served. A friendly neighbourhood took us under its wing and our reputation spread throughout the city. Everyone asked how four farm boys landed in a funky cafe. "It's a long story," I would grin.

But the farm was running out of time. The deadline to buy it back was December, 2000. Our only asset was our restaurant. Luxsole was like a colt gingerly taking its first steps. Our family depended on it the way we had depended on the farm. Would that farm ruin us one more time?

I made the call. I showed our banker, Rob, how four brothers poured their lives into this 50-seat cafe - as they had poured their lives into a farm. If we could mortgage the restaurant, I told him, we could buy our farm back.

As November, 2000, loomed, Chris and I happened to be in the tiny office in Luxsole's basement when Rob called. All I remember saying is, "Great, I'll be down to sign everything" as evenly as I could. Looking at Chris, I saw my tears reflected in his eyes. We called upstairs to tell everyone it was a go. Then we called Dad at home on the farm.

I helped Chris and Lawrence open a second location, Luxsole Downtown, in March, 2001. And Dad, now 63, harvested a bumper hay crop last fall.