FEELING AT HOME

I pushed snow around this morning. I think that’s the third of fourth time I’ve pushed snow around this winter as of January 1 and I’ve also been plowed out twice. There were winters in Pennsylvania that the snow shovel stood in the corner of the garage all winter, unloved and unused.

It’s about 12 degrees outside with the wind chill factor, and that’s the warmest it is supposed to be all day. I bundled up, the wind was quiet and I was perfectly warm. That’s an odd feeling for me to get used to. Yesterday I did my ten minute meditation outside because somehow I decided that the teens were warm enough. I put on my long underwear, my hoodie and winter coat, the glove liners and the mittens and out I went. Of course, normally I put some cushions under my butt, but the container was frozen shut. A lesson to be learned.

I am surprised to say that all this feels oddly fine. The last few days I’ve walked in the woods instead of on the dirt road because of the ice that covers it. Yak Trak are my true friend (that’s like snow tires for your shoes—kind of coil metal springs that attach and give you traction). I bought carrots from a local farm because I stupidly didn’t realize I couldn’t dig carrots all winter (I could in the Mid-Atlantic). I also bought a Gilfeather Turnip which is, believe it or not, the state vegetable. It doesn’t look like the turnips I grew up with which I hated eating, it’s kind of this ungainly looking spherical ball with some hair sticking out, the kind most humans would pluck. My carrots when I could harvest them looked like that too, not the spherical part but the hairy roots part. The carrots from the farm via the coop are organic and they are as pretty and perfect as could be. The consumer mindset extends to food, as if the perfect carrots are somehow better than my knobby mess which is hibernating underground until the ground thaws enough that I can harvest them.

I look out my window at the snow covering the field and the roof of the barn. I express my gratitude that I don’t have to go anywhere and fight any kind of treacherous driving conditions. Is my life perfect? Of course not. But I feel at home. I am grateful