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January in Datil’s Swingle Canyon – an exercise in cold

Near the author’s home in Swingle Canyon.

January, the start of a new year, a new century, a new millennium. A year, a blank slate in which the furnace hasn’t yet broken, the road hasn’t mudded out, the chimney hasn’t caught fire, the pump hasn’t quit. All these joys of winter life in Datil’s Swingle Canyon are yet to come.

Days stretch before me in January – a month of 31 shivering days, the coldest of the year where I live. An altitude of almost 8000 feet in the Datil Mountains of New Mexico makes the word ’south’, as in ’southwest’, a contradiction in terms.

So let’s get with the program, the exercise program, guaranteed to churn up the bloodstream and make the days pass faster. Here are some high country exercises for January I bet Richard Simmons doesn’t know about:

1) The Gas Pump. Starting the pickup on a three degree morning requires not only strength of foot for pumping the gas pedal, but strength of character including patience, practice, persistence and prayer. Defeat involves starting (or attempting to start) the old smashed-up pickup or calling a neighbor for transportation or help, a distinct loss of face.

2) The Slip Slide. Good footwork and a sense of balance work together in negotiating the slick of melted and refrozen snow on the porch steps. The difficulty is further compounded by Sylvia’s large puppy paws clouting the chest area; Sylvia heeds not the word “Down!” A fall is not advised since the nearest ambulance is 45 miles away and the nearest hospital 70 miles in the other direction.

3) The Wood Carry. There’s nothing like the Wood Carry to set the blood circulating and the muscles aching unless it be:

4) The Wood Splitting.

5) The Thermometer Run.  For one who can tolerate only lighter forms of exercise, there’s the Thermometer Run. The idea is to see how many trips can be made to the bedroom to look at the inside-outside thermometer.

Reporting on the results makes this a more challenging feat of memory. “It’s 14.3 degrees outside and 52.7 degrees in the bedroom.” The thermometer reads 68 degrees in the living room where a fire blazes in the fireplace, and the electric heater going at 1500 watts eats money like popcorn in a movie theatre. The propane furnace which rumbles sadly in the attic brings warm air down to chest height, while adding to the electric and gas bills.

A mental mathematic exercise can combine with the Thermometer Run. This involves calculating how much each cold evening is worth in heating costs. The results are calculated to make the blood boil.

6) The Ice Break. After throwing hay at the horse in the morning, take the ax and hack away at the four-inch ice covering the horse’s water tank. Do not do this before feeding the horse lest she bite you.

7) The Corral Shovel appears unrewarding, but is excellent for the shoulders and upper arms. Like doing dishes, it only has to be done again the next day. If not done, the road apples are likely to freeze to the ground, not to peel up until mud season in March or April.

Crossing the Cattleguard. Navigating this on foot while taking a walk in the glorious shimmering snow is a test of balance, judgment, footwork and faith. It’s easy for RingWorm, the cat. Sylvia, after a fall through the crosspieces requiring extrication by humans, cops out by going under the fence.

9) The Date Write can be done inside when the morning is crisp enough to be breakable. Fingers, wrist and mind are exercised when practicing writing the year 2000. It’s always taken me until the middle of February to get used to changing one or two digits when writing checks. I might manage all four by the year 2001.

10) Hope. Hope that tomorrow will be warmer; that it will be possible to sue the washing machine which lives (and freezes) in the Cold Room (the unheated, poorly-insulated room that was going to be my office, always refrigerator cold, now deep freezer temperature); hope that February will come and, after it, March and someday, Spring.

11) Joy. Joy in a crisp, frigid morning with Sylvia’s bounding delight at the coming of another day. The joy of entering a warm house after a bracing walk. The joy of seeing animal tracks in the snow. The one’s a deer. Rabbit tracks forming a silly triangle. Over there’s something very small; surely too tiny to survive on a day like today. And that squiggle is totally unidentifiable. Don’t snakes hibernate in the winter?

12) Further Joys. The brightness of the full moon on the snow: the joy of looking out the window through icicles at the frosting of snow on ponderosa and oak branches; the joy of the sun which shines 354 days a year in New Mexico; the joy of not spending the winter in Chicago with car- height snow, damp piercing winds off the lake, endless gray skies and depression as deep as the piled-up snow; the joy of turning the corner, entering my gate, catching sight of the barn and knowing I’m home in my corner of the world – Swingle Canyon

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