The Sheer Luck of Location
Sparkles everywhere I look. A magpie’s paradise, spread out at my feet.
Last Sunday’s fourteen-plus inches of snow got a middle-of-the-night fluffing while the cats and I were sleeping and now the rolling expanse of land looks like a cake decorated with edible crystal glitter. It’s too much for my eyes to bear without squinting and thank goodness for my sunglasses. One of the stems is bent but they still cling fast to my head as I make my way through a tunneled path from the porch to the coop. The girls have been feathered troopers this past week, huddled and hunched in the darkness of their protective shelter during the subzero nights, waking to my gentle calls and the promise of warm water in their repurposed restaurant steam pan. I’ve taken to checking the marked down produce at the store, scoring bags of nectarines and peaches that never quite ripened, and tossing them into the feeder with the cracked corn. I’ve also been mixing in handfuls of chili pepper flakes—advice from a poultry magazine—to help the girls generate a tad more heat in their little bodies as insurance against frostbite. It seems to be working.
The sun is cold and big in the sky and that means more fantastical ice sculptures dangling from the eaves later today. I have this crazy idea that I could probably get out the aluminum step ladder, climb just high enough with the push broom in one hand, and move some of the snow off the small section of roof that hangs over the kitchen window. No trips to the ER is my motto these days, but wouldn’t I bring a fun story for the suture techs to pass around at lunchtime after they’ve sewn up my cracked skull? I’ll see how much I can brush off from my tiny place on the ground below; the ladder voted to remain in hibernation until April. At least.
It’s important to note that I haven’t walked the land in almost three weeks and it’s making me feel restlessly reckless. There’s a foot-wide path around the house (later this morning, I’ll sweep off the propane tank and lift the lid on the gauge so I can get a proper reading to submit to the energy co-op), and, finally, I see deer tracks in the field around the sleeping garden. There were apples in the produce mark-down section too; I’ll rest a few on the log beneath the silent mulberry tree off the porch and hope they’ll be gone by morning.
Staying put doesn’t mean lack of movement, just a limited orbit for my feet and me. It’s not what I’m used to and I listen for the lesson in it all: be in the moment. Look around and appreciate where you are and what you have. What I have are four cabin-fevered cats who have turned the living room into their own parkour playground with no regard for the carefully positioned throw rugs trying to keep the floor warm. I also have a freezer full of soup, chicken tenders, frozen peas, gluten-free everything bagels and English muffins, black bean burgers, butter, garbanzo bean rotini pasta, and lemon raspberry Greek yogurt bark broken into thick shards with a flavor that reminds me of summer. The tea cabinet is also well-stocked; visitors (if there were any—there’s really no place for them to park without getting stuck in the snow) wouldn’t go wanting for a hot beverage steeped in a mug with bees painted on it. On a whim this morning, I made a perfect batch of hummus and boiled cubes of tofu (all the rage these days, apparently) for a sesame ginger stir fry. My heart longs for a trek north to the woods soon, and what a joyous reunion that will be. Until then, the floors are swept, eggs gathered and washed, kitchen faucet dripping just enough to reassure me to sleep at night, and window quilts holding in as much heat as they can.
Last week, I acknowledged my luck in living here and that’s a refrain I keep on repeat. It never gets old and keeps my gratitude practice humming along. Wherever I am on this slice of homestead paradise, there is beauty and humility in abundance. The cats know it, the chickens know it, and of course so do all the deer and squirrels and foxes and those invisible coyotes who yip and howl their way through the meadow while the moon gives them a well-deserved spotlight. Sometimes, when I’m at work downtown, surrounded by concrete and towering glass buildings, I walk the land in my mind, disappearing into the tree-lined paths and not wanting to return, ever. Wherever I go, she comes with me, this expanse of soil and vegetation, wildlife and avian sanctuary unparalleled.
In a few weeks, the creek will swell beyond its banks with snowmelt, singing her way along the rocks and sycamores that hold her close. I’ll walk beside her, happy for the sound that will come to rest in my grateful ears, and add another day to my collection of being in the most beautiful place on earth.
