Nov. 4, 2009 - Black Maximus in Winter White
I left the house this morning with one thought on my mind. I hate winter. I hate how much you have to put on just to stay warm outside. I hate how restrictive all that clothing is. I hate having to scrape the windows before going anywhere. I can’t reach the whole windshield, so there is always a section in the middle that I can’t see through. I hate that my fingers get cold doing anything outside even in warm mitts, and there are things one can’t do with warm mitts on because one needs one’s fingers. Those things you must do very quickly! I hate that no matter how many socks I put between my feet and my boots, and even though I’m wearing Sorrels that are supposed to be good down to -40, my toes get cold if I’m outside for very long. Maybe the fact that they’re about 20 years old has something to do with that. Or maybe it’s got more to do with my age than the age of the boots…
I try to stay indoors as much as possible from the first frost until the spring melt, but that leaves me with cabin fever because I can’t stand being inside for so long. In the spring I get very stir crazy because I feel such a strong need to get outside, yet I can’t go outside without freezing or without several layers of restrictive clothing. The thing I hate most about winter is that it’s cold. I have to wear multiple sweaters inside to stay even remotely warm, and that’s with the furnace turned to 23 degrees celcius. I often find that the only way to warm up is to take a bath – a bath so hot that my face stays red for an hour after I get out. That truly warms me and I am able to be comfortable for the rest of the evening when I do this. Otherwise I can feel cold for weeks straight, without ever warming up. I hate it.
This was on my mind this morning as I spent ten minutes scraping frost off the truck windows. It’s not terribly cold yet, but after 15 years in this northern climate I have learned to dread the oncoming winter. Not even so much because it’s so cold as because it’s so long. Even this year, when winter was a bit later in coming, the first snowfall – something I used to find beautiful – only reminded me that the long winter was about to begin. “Here we go,” I thought despondently, gritting my teeth in preparation for the long, cold months ahead. This morning’s frost only reminded me that winter has begun. It is early November now, so it really was a late start, but I know that I will probably not be truly warm again until at least May.
I got in the car and drove reluctantly slow over the icy roads. It takes so much longer to do anything in the winter, I moaned inwardly. I turned into the saddle club and pulled up to Max’s temporary paddock. They are still building his stall, so he has to be out here in the meantime. Yet another thing to add to my list of why I hate winter. There is no electricity out here, so we can’t use a water heater. Instead we have to haul warm water from home 2 or 3 times a day so that he has water to drink. But before refilling his water bucket I have to chip the ice out. My son rakes up manure and says his hands are cold. I give him my warm mitts and keep my own hands warm rubbing in Max’s thick winter coat of fur.
It doesn’t take long to shrug the winter blues. In fact, as soon as we start working in the paddock the blues slip away. I shovelled, filled the water bucket, got the hay, and stroked some of the white frost off Max’s black mane and back. Max’s full name is Go Boy’s Black Maximus. Go Boys is from his sire’s name. Maximus is Latin for greatest or biggest. This big, black horse is well named. There is something magical about caring for a horse. At least for me there is. We’ve had Max for about a month now, and I still love every job I’ve had to do for him. The only thing I haven’t enjoyed is being cold while doing those jobs. Still, even when I go and think I won’t stay long because it’s too cold, I find that I don’t want to leave. I enjoy working at the paddock and especially being around Max. We’re still getting to know each other, and I want to spend as long as I can there every day to facilitate that process.
But eventually we do have to get home. So we pile into the truck and head back out to the highway. But first we have to drive through the field where the large round bales of hay are kept, and it is there that I noticed the beauty of winter for the first time this year. A beauty I used to appreciate, but having endured so many long winters I now often miss. The long grass in the field was covered in frost, and it glistened in the morning sun, reflecting, like millions of tiny prisms, all the colours of the rainbow.
If nothing else, living up here as afforded me many beautiful sights of winter that I had never seen in the more southerly climate I grew up in. This was definitely one of them. I watched the twinkling frost as I drove through the field and back out to the highway, knowing that winter does have some beautiful redeeming qualities. I thought this winter would be harder because I have to be outside every day. Could be possible that this “Great Black” horse who has already blessed us in so many ways, will also make this winter just that much more bearable? I’m beginning to think he might.
