Keeping Kith with a Midwinter Thaw

This morning, my husband and I were talking about how, despite the fact that time does seem to be going faster and faster the older we get, this January was 10 full years long.“I can’t even remember Christmas,” my daughter piped from the back seat.Technically, we are halfway through winter, but considering that winter storms often arrive here on the western plains well into April and even May, we are at best a quarter of the way through. And if February feels anything like January did, we have another arduous decade ahead.This obviously isn’t just, or even mostly, because of the weather, but what we are facing as a country and a species feels just as intractable as the frozen soil that stretches as far as the eye can see. When the cold is this deep, it is hard to imagine it will ever be spring.Enter stage left, a midwinter thaw, carried by the chinook wind…and suddenly there are—briefly—puddles, the smell of mud, the sense memory of warmth, the freedom to throw off our winter coats, if only for a few hours…it isn’t spring…not even close…but the earth stirs, gently moving, tilting, turning toward the next hour, day, month, until one day it is. Get full access to Our Little Pasture at elizablue.substack.com/subscribe