Horse Blankets & Skipped Meals

Every Day Is All There Is

My apologies for not having an audio version available at this time. I had dental work and my mouth is swollen. I will post the audio in a few days with added content and conversation!

I headed out to the pasture with Mabel’s blanket over my shoulder. It was the last chore of the day. Usually the weight of it feels like an oversized sweater but today it felt heavier, enough to notice the hindrance.

My batteries were drained. Days ago I had to get an emergency molar extraction. I have two infected root canals I couldn’t afford to crown the first time they were treated and both recently got reinfected. It will take a long time to save up for a single tooth to be re-canaled and crowned, so I made the decision to have the one farther back in my mouth pulled on the spot. I can always replace it with an implant in the future if things improve.

I don’t regret the loss but the pain was awful after the novocain wore off and has lasted days. I refused any prescription painkillers because I knew what they could become to a recovering addict like me. Ibuprofen is doing what it can. I still have deadlines to make, work to promote, and a farm to save.

So the pain was fine, preferred even. I’ve spent enough years of my life numbed by alcohol and shame, at least this ache meant I had solved half the problem. Now I just needed to earn the money back from the dentist’s bill on top of a late mortgage payment before Jan first. Then I can start saving for the surgery.

Here’s the good news: I’m already 2/3rd of the way to a house payment and there’s still two weeks left to earn the rest! Hope is all I need. I could see the extraction as a setback or I could see it as a new-and-improved goalpost, a reason to wake up howling with my remaining teeth bared... But I wasn’t feeling like howling the now. I was so weak a synthetic horse blanket felt heavy enough to wear during an x-ray.

What was going on with my body? Is this getting sick?

I am never sick. The last time I was sick was March 2020, with a 24-hr stomach bug that had me shivering and chained to my toilet, but not since. Not in a way that made me feel this weak at least. To my knowledge I never had Covid, or at least never tested positive for it or experienced any symptoms. Feeling weak is scary to me. So much scarier than dentists or pain.

When I walked up to Mabel in the last blue light of dusk she lifted her thick neck and gave me a gentle snicker, then returned to her hay. It only took a few minutes to drape the insulated blanket over her back and then snap the buckles around her belly and chest. Once covered, I nodded at the work, scratched her ears, and headed back towards the farmhouse. It was almost dark and the solar lanterns were flickering on all over the property.

Walking home in the snow I felt lighter, and not just because I handed over the blanket. I had gotten through another day. Chores were done, the fires were lit, the house warm enough to not be embarrassed to have company over.

I made fists to keep my fingers warm. My toes felt numb, something new that started happening this year. Blanketing the mare was the last chore of the evening and the hour I was outside carrying buckets and hay had all 20 phalanges tingling.

I never got this cold when I was heavier. I’ve lost 20-30lbs this year and that’s a lot of insulation to forgo. Even my shoes and underwear are big on me now. I made a mental note to invest in some toe warmers and silk liners for my work gloves, inexpensive ways to make winter work a little gentler.

As I trudged on my house came into view. It doesn’t look like the farm houses on Instagram or in storybooks. It has missing flashing and green mold on the vinyl siding in north-facing places. The stone roof lays heavy. The once-green lawn horses grazed all summer was now a Pollock splatter of mud and snow half melted then refrozen. It didn’t look like someone’s dream life. It looks like the inside of a fraternity’s refrigerator.

It’s a farm only a mother could love in scrub winter, but beyond the scrappiness I could see the windows glow and smiled. The house’s interior was lit with fires, fairy lights, and candles. From outside it looked pretty. I knew when I walked back in it would be cozy as a badger’s den. It better be, as I had been feeding stoves all day like I was stoking a blacksmith’s fire.

The Day the Stars Fell, Nov 12th 1833

It was too dark now to see the surface imperfections and both chimneys were boasting plumes of white smoke up into the cold stars. I watched a meteor wiz past.

I wondered if I would ever live long enough to see a star storm like in 1833? People walked outside and thought the world was ending or beginning anew that day in November. I am more jealous of them than anyone with a pension. I did make a wish on the one star I saw fall.

I’ll take what I can get.