Tonight I sit out on the deck wrapped in the well worn poncho as I have found myself held in this heavy wool so many times before this night. My feet are on the railing; my head tilts back. Behind the now leafless old oak that shades the deck in summer appears the waning moon. She glows silver across the night pasture where fog spreads thick as sea foam. I can hear the gentle shifting of the horses in the barn, and the ever present hum of the inky river just a stone’s throw below. The dogs are beside me. Silent and attentive, staring out into the black beyond, waiting. The bears have been keeping them busy with the warm weather and bright moon.

Overhead, through lace of slender branches of this sprawling tree, few stars glint like Christmas ornaments hanging in the sky.

The ever present sound of the river blends into the darkness and becomes a noise you forget you’re hearing.

There is only a simple silence.

Time and space to breathe.

We settle into the season of long shadows, long nights.

Like the bear. That’s what this season of slowing and settling calls for.

Here in the far north of California in the land of big trees, big rain, big swaths of blackberries and poison oak, the bear does not necessarily hibernate so much as simply slow down. From the recent barking of the dogs, I don’t know how much they’ve even done that. It’s been a mild season so far. Garden roses still bloom. Stores remain plentiful after a bountiful season of lush grass, mushrooms, madrone berries and acorns. It’s easy to see what they’ve been eating by the scat they plainly leave randomly along our quiet dirt road.

With two big dogs, I don’t get to see those bears much. Usually just a big blob of a bear butt running up a hill. Sometimes up a tree.

Still, I feel it, and I’m sure the bears do too. Now is not the season of plenty, but of holing up. Slowing down. And turning within.

The rooster does not crow until some time past six in the morning and the horses come in for the night around five. That makes for long evenings, time for baking, reading, writing, board games, enjoying long lingering dinners lit by candles and twinkle lights, snuggling on the sofa with a couple of cats, reading aloud together, soaking in hot baths… these are winter pleasures.

In spite of the mild weather we’ve been having, we heed the call of the natural exhale after spring/summer/harvest/fall running around full speed in what feels like endless daylight. For those of us who work outside as long as the sun shines, winter is the time to transform into an indoor cat, at least during those long nights. Winter is a reprieve. A blessing. I long for it by the end of summer every year. Time to breathe. To let out a long, full, deep exhale. Before the anxious inhale of spring begins anew.

Seasons, like emotions, these ever flowing, passing states, one folding into the next like whipped eggs whites or cream.

When what I want sometimes is to hold onto forever. Something solid. Never changing.

As futile as clinging to ocean waves.

Rather than accept and appreciate the inevitable.

Ebbs and flows, tides and moons, the occasional passing storm.

Tonight the tide is low. I feel melancholy.

I want a drink. Come on, you say. Go ahead. Just one.

Alas, for some of us, it doesn’t work that way. Maybe this time it would. This time I could. I’d be okay. Holding the firm stem in my fingers as I swirl the familiar luring fragrance emanating from the liquid red velvet lit from the glow of the kitchen lamp behind me. And then let it roll across my lips and linger on my tongue like nectar – silky, rich and smoky.  

No.

It’s nearly seven years since I went sober, yet some days (usually nights) I can imagine drinking so vividly as if it were just yesterday. Some days it feels like it’s not getting easier. Tonight is one of those nights.

I’ll get over it. There’s power in reminding myself I made it this far. I can keep on keeping on.

Use your grit, gal.

And grit, well, that much I got.

Things change.

Today, tomorrow, yesterday.

Every day is different. Even on those days when what I feel is so familiar. When what I feel is that “ground hog day” replaying over and over and over again.

Wake in the dark. Tuck the blankets back around Bob. Pet (and step over) the still sleeping pups. Get the fire going, the coffee on, roll out the yoga mat and get down on it, stretch, meditate, light a candle to write, then as gray daylight waxes across the meadow of chalky fog, head out to let the chickens out, feed the horses, walk the dogs.  Return…

Grounding in the familiar. This simple life. A life though maybe a little different than yours, so similar in so far as both of us probably turn in each night thinking we didn’t get half as much done as we planned to do.

There are books and poems to write, horses to teach and dogs to train, bread to bake, wood to split, roses to prune and a compost pile to turn, a barn wall to rebuild and basement walls to trim out, rocks to stack and dirt to move and the damn floor needs to be swept again.

I want more time. Or maybe more energy. But that to-do list never seems to go away, just flows from one set of priorities to the next. It’s that ebb and flow thing once again. And at the end of each day, we hope we made a little headway, though how often do we feel we’re drowning.

Today.

Grounded, not because of the place, the view before me, but because of the feeling within me.

And under me. Crow, my old faithful horse. Beside me, Bob and the dogs and the last of autumn’s sweet air that allows us to feel the sun on ungloved hands and my graying hair still free from the confinement of a winter cap.

Sometimes you find yourself…. Exactly where you belong. It’s not a place, but a feeling, something inside.

For me, it’s a wild place, sounded by wind through leafless trees and the cadence of hard hooves on soft dirt.

It’s finding myself on the back of my dear horse where I’ve found myself for thousands of miles before this one.

And time stops, or no longer matters.

And I’m just there, the bones of my pelvis padded by Crow’s warm winter coat.

The sound of my breath, his breath, the rhythm of his footfall.

It’s watching my horse’s mane shift and sway as he walks, like ripples in the river into which my open hand reaches, sinks in, and already knows the softness it will touch as my fingers intertwine with his black mane.  So familiar, the feel of bare hands in soft hair, deep into the comfort of the back of his neck. The familiar fragrance of freshly cut fir trees and wild mint as the horses cross the creek, mingling with their sweet musky sweat in the oddly mild air where my legs are wrapped around a familiar warm back, without a saddle between us to sever the connection.

It’s turning to see Bob in his own world beside me, comfortable and content on the back of the new horse, Jesse. He’s perched in a place where he’s been holding space since long before I was born, and I smile. He may not see it. I’m riding in front. But he knows it. He always knows it. If he wants me to just let go, to relax, to forget about all the should-woulda-couldas, to just be, and to smile, get the gal on her horse.

This feels like home. On the back of the horse. With my husband and dogs close by and the soft sun and leafless trees and the smell of those leaves, now grounded, brown and brittle, through which the horses walk. Today there’s no need to train or work or get somewhere or get something done, just be with the horses, the land, one another. Where we belong.

It is a return to center.

Coming back home, within.

Until next time,

With love,

Always love,

Gin