They call me, Graeme

For years I have been tough. I suppose my whole life, to be precise. I have spent days upon days lugging hay bales across fields and throwing 100 bale loads into haylofts. I have wrestled goats and sheared sheep. I have climbed mountains and trees, ripping holes in my tights and skirts.

I have cried over movies, books, songs, beautiful winter skylines, sunsets behind frozen fields that lay fallow. I have sobbed as though my heart would break over men, horses, loved ones and the coldness of the world. But, every time, I would stand right up, wipe my nose and carry on building a fence, catching chickens, working my 8 hours shift, whatever.

I am telling you of this toughness not to brag, but to explain my character a bit to you all. My mother often calls me, Graeme, to tease how often I did the men's work around the farm. I bear this nickname proudly and have never once been ashamed of my muscles and scars. I am made of tougher fiber than most, but growing that thick skin was no easy feat. I often tell those who don't understand me that I wish I could have a book on tape made of my mind so as to show them how I have become the little draft horse I am today.

I am not delicate to the eye, solidly built and heavily boned and muscled, I resemble a stocky Belgian draft horse rather than an elegant thoroughbred. My voice is deep and powerful and my hands are coarse and covered in callouses and remnants of scrapes and splinters. Busted knuckles and uneven nails.

Today, like many other days in my life, I left a sleepless and troubled bed at the crack of dawn to begin a very long day. I spent several hours in the cold and rain mucking stalls, refilling water buckets, checking over legs and blanket buckles to ensure all the horses were looking tip-top. I cannot do the feeling justice. The mist covering my hair and woolen sweater in fine beads of moisture, the steady clop of heavy hooves over hard earth, the rich must of horse dander and the ache of tired muscles are the best cure for emotional wretchedness.

As I picked the stalls with an automatic and long-known ease, I allowed my mind and heart to mull over the last few years of my life. The shock I have borne, the world I have lifted and let fall, the heart I have nursed back to life time and again. The people I will forever call strangers and all the grief suffered over those still alive.

I am a lucky girl in so many ways. I lead a BIG life, a rich one, full of beauty and experience and I pay for it dearly. I work HARD and non-stop. I squeeze drives around my homeland into brief afternoons off and a few nights here and there are spent dancing to a local band's tunes.

I am a writer, a baker, a great lover of all things bright and beautiful and all creatures great and small. And yet, no matter how hard I may try to explain myself or my reasons for the mistakes I have made in my past, I can never seem to make anyone know how it feels to wear these mud-covered, worn-soled, scratched, well-loved shoes I walk mile after mile in, every day.

I am judged, questioned, dropped, picked up, tousled around and misunderstood. Hey, who isn't?

Today, as I sit here, recovering from total exhaustion of body, heart and mind, I seek a better way to love others despite the past, present and future. After all, we can never know what horrors they have seen and what roads they have trekked.

Taking refuge for the first time in days tonight in my little cabin. I hope you all can do the same, should you desire it.