The grass that continued to grow long after it should is now frost-flattened and pale. I take hay to the horses. This is an easier task now that the lanes have thawed a little; of late they have been rippled glaciers, effectively icing us in.
Still, feeding the horses has turned into a careful sport. I twist four wedges of hay up in a neat baler twine handle and, avoiding 100 metres of glassy lane, I lug it across a field and through the wood.
I balance through the gateway, where hardened hoof divots now have iced roofs, with intricate struts and beams. I imagine them as opaque conservatories for mice and voles, sheltering from hungry owls.
The horses follow me across the field, snatching tugs of hay slung from my shoulder, jerking me backwards. As I walk, there is an ease and creak of frozen, puddingy ground underfoot, interspersed with the toffee snap of puddles; the layers of ice, grass, leaf mulch and mud are pressed like a Viennetta straight from the freezer.
After ice-breaking the water buckets, I empty a row of cold moons on to the grass. On the other side of the hedge, the bus gives way to a car, then becomes stuck, wheels spinning on treacherous glazing. I climb the gate and try skating up the lane in my boots to get help from the farm. I eventually resort to the edge, where tractor-tyre prints lend a grip, WhatsApping as I go: “Anyone about to help?”
The farmer appears in a four-wheel drive and shovels down grit for the bus like birdseed. The bus grips and moves on, earning us cheery waves from the passengers.
The surface frost has thawed now, but I can feel it still deep in the ground through my wellies, leaving it slick and “greazy” in places. An old horseman’s remembered wisdom comes back to me from just a few years ago: “Careful today. The top yields but you’ll get only an inch of purchase from it.” Fondling the density of the pony’s coat, I don’t think winter’s done with us yet.
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