Brutal cold is making life difficult in many parts of the country right now. Even Florida is feeling it, god bless ’em, where fruit growers are spraying fields to protect their fruits with a coating of ice.
Just hunkering down in a warm house is a blessing when it’s this cold. For all the folks out on roads and highways, this weather is a nightmare; scary, nerve-wracking, unpredictable. And for those whose fortunes do not currently include a warm house to stay cozy in, it’s life-threatening.
I lived with bitter cold for many years, growing up in northern Colorado. I remember it well, as do my fingertips; they still tingle with memory of mild frostbite and turn white and numb if I fail to protect them with gloves when the temperature drops. And looking at Moonmeadow Farm’s picture of her wood cookstove reminds me of waking up to frigid mornings in a drafty logging cabin at 6,000 ft, shivering out of bed to light a fire in the cold, dark mornings before work. Yes, I know cold. It’s been awhile, but I remember it.
It is 24 degrees this morning east of Campbellsville, KY at the Farm, and a light snow is falling. At Ridgewind Farm in Virginia, where the horses are, it’s 22 but “feels like” 10 degrees, and cloudy. In Vail, CO where Skidder is working the ski resorts, it’s 10 degrees and cloudy, too.
Out east of Fort Collins, Colorado (my home town) where the good folks of Boyles Family Farms are hunkered down next to the wood stove, it is minus eleven degrees. Now that’s cold!
In Bonita, California where I am it is currently 45 degrees and clear. And it’ll probably get up to 75 this afternoon. The disparity between our winter temps and what is experienced across the rest of the nation is never far from my mind. I am mentally bracing myself, I think, to return to the real world of seasons that include the discomfort of cold.
Meanwhile, although it doesn’t take much to warm a 1,500-sq-ft house at this latitude, we burn a small fire in the evenings to take the chill off, with eucalyptus firewood bought locally from Garcia’s Firewood in El Cajon. My little Toyota Tacoma has to make two trips to bring home half a cord, but that will last us well into next year, so the trouble is worth it. The ashes enrich my compost pile and the labor of stacking and carrying in keeps me from getting too soft.
Wherever you are this morning, bundle up well when you go outside, shut the doors firmly behind you when you come in, keep the fire well-stoked, and stay warm.
Thistledog's Farm 
No fires down here – fireplaces are rare in S. Florida. It has been quite chilly for this part of the country – it got up to 50 today and is going back down to 34 (or lower) by tomorrow morning. Brrrrrr!!!! It is so humid that 34 here feels like 25 in other parts of the country. The cats are inside the house, enjoying the warmth. My new cat learned from my other cat how to open the front door to get in. Quite an amazing feat for a cat – she pulls the lever handle down and because the door is just a tad out of plumb, by leaning on the door, it opens. She can’t get out but I had a cat who had that trick down pat, too – he pulled on the bottom of the door to open it once it was unlatched.
Smart cats!
Talking about your cats enjoying the warm house in this unseasonable cold reminds me of our childhood cat, Charlie, who absolutely detested snow. He refused to go outside when there was snow on the ground, and would sit and look out the window as though searching for the “door into summer” as my mother would say.
Hopefully that extreme southern cold moves on fast!