While some high school graduates struggle to choose a career, Molly Merrifield already has a few, and she’s been working at them for a while.

The Gorham High School graduate grew up on Merrifield Farm, a 25-acre spread in North Gorham, where she helped her parents, Lyle and Jo-Ann, produce maple syrup and make many delicious things with it.

When Merrifield was in seventh grade, she made a trip that winter to the renowned Pennsylvania Farm Show in Harrisburg. She ventured into the noisy, crowded arena of the livestock auction and placed the winning bid on a bred Duroc sow.

She bought the burgundy brown pig, named Powerwheels for good reason, with $500 she had saved from raising and showing other pigs. She showed the sow’s seven piglets that September at the Cumberland Fair. They won several ribbons, and she sold them all.

“That was the spark of breeding my own,” Merrifield said. “I’ve kind of built a name for myself, and people know that I raise quality pigs.”

She continued to raise pigs and working steers, showing at five fairs each year, and became the president of two 4-H clubs, an organization she joined when she was 3 years old. She was selected to go to the weeklong 4-H Citizenship Washington Focus last summer in Washington, D.C. And she has been part of the 4-H Teens as Teachers program, an experience she especially enjoyed.

“I like working with little kids and giving them someone to look up to,” she said. “I also like showing them little tricks to help them show their animals well, like the best way to present animals and how to talk to judges and answer questions.”

Merrifield completed a two-week senior internship project at Custom Cuts & Nails in Standish, where she got a taste of her other career interest. She plans to study hairstyling at Spa Tech Institute in Westbrook in the fall.

She played varsity basketball all four years at Gorham High, and was elected captain her senior year, when the team won the state championship. She graduated with high honors, overcoming the challenges of dyslexia.

Through it all, she worked as a waitress at Gilbert’s Chowder House in Windham, a job she plans to keep while she learns hairstyling and beyond. She also hopes to become a 4-H judge next year, after she ages out of the program. And she will probably always breed and raise pigs and steers.

She sees her animals as intelligent, sensitive beings that are fun to work with and bring joy into her life. Sometimes they’re better than humans.

“The bond between owner and animals is hard to explain,” Merrifield said. “Being around them never gets old.”

– By Kelley Bouchard