The Winter of Deep Mud

Though this might appear to be complaining, it is mere observation. I do not want to be caught complaining about something as simple as mud when Colorado suffered over 300 avalanches this winter - when California was on fire last fall - when people are suffering snowfall measured in feet not inches. Let me just say I will be profoundly more appreciative when the soil between my door and the barn has solidified back into firm dirt. I must lace my work boots extra tightly to prevent them from being sucked off my feet when I wade through the deep mud on the way to the barn. And my poor horses! Wally is one big mud pie. He gets mud on his face and in his ears! Ginger gets muddy but never as messy as Wally. Their hooves have cut into the soil in the new corral and most likely the big blue stem will not come back in the worst of it. Weeds - cockle burrs and stinging nettles - will be likely all that grows if spring ever arrives this year. Again, I am not complaining. The water tank is a mere 75 feet from the faucet now and I can quickly drain the water out of the hose after filling the tank. I only had to chop ice a few times this winter before the tank was moved close enough to electricity to use a tank heater. The horses have fresh water 24 hours a day!

The beautiful wood floor in my house is covered in muddy dog paw prints from Miss Mattie coming and going and from my own shoes and boots - though I have tried mightily to limit the import of mud into the house. Every rug is filthy but no sense in hauling them to the laundromat before the world dries up. Still not complaining! I will simply be exceedingly grateful when there is grass once again covering all the mud holes around the house.

A lot of rain is forecast beginning Tuesday afternoon. As saturated as the soil is, the creek could easily flood. Though I built the house on a high point, the water could come around the house and possibly get into the crawl space, maybe even into the garage. That seems unlikely, but the strange violence and unpredictability of the weather now makes it seem far more possible. If the creek escapes the banks, it can quite easily flood the old garage, including the pit of despair where the whangdoodles reside - the portal to hell I reluctantly enter in order to plug in the space heater when temperatures fall below 10 degrees. (Okay, I am straight up complaining about the portal to hell.)

It has been a long winter, cold and frozen and muddy and dreary. Not the worst winter but I have had my fill of deep mud though there is likely another two months of it on tap. Still, mud is better than a ten day electrical outage caused by an ice storm. Mud is better than 8" of snow that stranded me for three days. Mud is better than tornadoes. Mud is a million times better than drought! There are a million things worse than mud but right now, I can only think of a few.

Just to be clear:  still not complaining...

Beneath all this pristine white is a bottomless pit of mud...