Thursday

I ask Ed -- do you think we could install a hanging bar? They're only $20 and the article on aging and fitness says that they are monumentally effective in building and maintaining upper body strength!

Ed, who has been struggling with his own knee issues looks over his computer screen skeptically. Cant you just walk over to the monkey bars at the playground and hang there? 

That's a ten minute walk! Each way. You need to do this regularly!

You want one up in the barn? 

I feel like if I hang from a barn beam, I'll bring the whole structure down. That place looks to me like it's ready to topple any day now. Besides, the air there is polluted with chicken dust. I share my wisdoms on this with Ed. He grunts and goes back to his computer work.

The fact it that we are always innovating in the way we move in the course of our daily routines. Come summer time, my flower fields keep me busy: squatting, heaving dirt, and pulling weeds uses muscle groups I didn't even know existed. But in the non growing seasons, we need to get creative. Neither of us likes tedious repetition. Boredom is a horrible partner to most forms of exercise. Doing pool laps? Yawn... Treadmill? Done that, hated it. But hanging seems fun! I decide to give it a whirl, over at the playground, today.

But first, there are the animals to feed. On the upside, the snow on the paths is gone! I mean, it does look dreadfully dismal right now, but you have to remember that these weeks are like Christmas Eve: grand because of the anticipation of what's to come.

On the downside, I see that there has been some fighting here, and I have a terrible feeling it involved an attempt by Pancake to enter the sheep shed. I spot traces of blood at the indoor exit ramp. Darn those territorial cats. Live and let live, you beasts! You all get more than enough food!

Discouraged, I fix breakfast for the two of us. Oatmeal, so long as we're on a day of fitness preoccupation.

And then the monkey bars. The same ones that Snowdrop loves to navigate with alacrity. Me, I hang on for dear life! I can do all of ten seconds on the first try and it goes down to five seconds on the next attempts. I clearly need to dangle more often!

Feeling monumentally stronger, I return home and get back to my computer.

And in the afternoon, Snowdrop is here again.

She has her own ideas as to what photos I should take.

But the very last one, at drop off by her brothers' school, is a real prize and surprise. It is in the city, so the temps are slightly warmer here, but still, it's March 2nd and we have... Snowdrop by snowdrops!

And there you have it -- beauty, in a field of more somber colors. There, if you look for it.