The bitter cold work

What the hell am I doing here?

A tenet of life in Colorado is that Halloween costumes must accommodate winter wear underneath. For some reason, the cold and snow always appear just in time for trick-or-treating.

As a mother of little boys, the Halloween freeze is an annoying weather phenomenon for me now, but it was a blessing in my 20s - the "sexy" version of costumes were never practical in the cold. I leaned heavily on humor instead of the sultry outfit selections, which generally worked out for the best anyway.

This year, right on schedule, the snow started to fall, and the wall of bitter cold rolled off the mountains just in time for me to use double-stick tape to attach the fake mustaches to Mario and Luigi.

Unlike my childhood or even my 20s, though, that first real frost this year came with a long list of chores to ensure the little urban farm was ready for a deep freeze. The last zucchini, squash, and pumpkins had to get inside before they turned to rotting veggie ice cubes. All waterers for the animals had to have heaters plugged in, and the goats and chickens needed some extra high-protein feed to help them withstand the arctic temps.

When I was little, I remember the first snow of the season always felt magical. I would wake up in the morning and could smell it in the air before I even opened the blinds. Even inside a warm house, there's a crispiness that prickles all over your body when it's snowing outside.

Now, instead of magic, that familiar crispy feeling brings a bit of dread because I have to go outside into the cold. Part of the price I pay for the urban farming lifestyle is that I must do it all the time - when it's 90 degrees and negative ten. That doesn't mean, though, that I wake up in a warm bed and look outside to a frigid morning and want anything more than to burrow for just five more minutes.

Animals don't care if you want to stay in bed and drink cocoa; they want their buckets of warm water and food bowls filled to the brim. It's a promise that's harder to keep when you know that fulfilling your duty will make you that particular brand of deep cold that takes hours to shake from your bones.

This year, I bundled up against the cold and asked myself the perennial question: "What in the hell am I doing here?"

While taking my first steps out, the tips of my toes rebelled inside my boots at the bitter air. What keeps driving me to continue this endeavor when I could live a perfectly content life that allows for cocoa in bed and five more minutes under the covers?

But - I promised - myself and the animals. So I gripped the handle of the bucket of warm water a little tighter and kept crunching through the snow. My toes wouldn't hurt for long anyway; they lose feeling fast, even with wool socks and thick boots.

It was watching my goats satisfyingly slurp up the warm water that reminded me why I keep doing this. It's the smallest things that can bring animals such joy. My goats don't worry about the past or what comes next; they exist entirely in the present moment.

As a human, I would be outside in my goats' spot and worry, "When will my next bucket of warm water come?" "What can I do to ensure I have warm water whenever needed?" And, I would miss the thing they have - relishing in the steam cloud rising off the bucket, taking gulps and sips and turns, meandering over to me to show their appreciation, and leaning into my calves for an extra scratch.

I marched back and forth from the house to the goat pen with steamy buckets until the girls lost interest. Fully satiated, they meandered about, looking for patches of sunshine in which to soak.

Once back in the house, my toes, fingers, and nose defrosted with that familiar tingle. I sat and sipped a cup of cocoa, and like my goats felt fully satisfied in the moment.

There is something about the warmth that hits different after the cold. In the same way that food tastes better when you're hungry or that light shines brighter in the dark, there is true beauty to find in contrasts.

So, what the hell am I doing here? Why would I subject myself willingly to hard and bitter cold work? Someday, I won't be able to crunch through the snow with buckets, and I will think back to the days when I looked for meaning and found beauty in the small things, and I'll sip my cocoa, and it will taste just a bit sweeter.