To the Bone
When we had been living in our “shepherd’s hut” on the Hill for about a year, things got hard. I mean, really hard. The adventure had worn thin. All that was left now was the two of us and our demons. We were facing into our second winter out there on the Hill, this time knowing what we were facing, knowing what hardships we could expect, with only the barest necessities, crammed uncomfortably into a sixteen foot caravan that rattled and leaked, and the rough, lean-to kitchen-porch we had built onto it that was never meant to last, that had gaps in the walls you could see daylight through. The wind up there on the Hill would whip through those gaps and whisk away the warmth from our little wood stove. The heavy door we had made out of the same rough, untreated timbers that we’d built our lean-to with had warped with the weather and it rattled on its latch and often blew open at night, waking us with a bang and a blast of cold. We were forced to face our demons, up there. There were no comforts to hide behind, no facade of well-being, no frills to smooth our jagged edges or soften the shapes of our own shadows.
By the time we were facing into our second winter in our shepherd’s hut,