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ONE

Ranger

The woods were a breathing thing The way the hispered through newly budding trees How the dry underbrush hissed across the floor, catching against shrubs and stacking up with half- piles of fallen leaves

The sounds were long since fahtly for years In the barns, the roll of furry bodies against hay was as predictable as the chorus of crickets, as inter hoot of the occasional owl high in a tree

My home kept as many secrets as it disclosed – the silent pads of rodent feet, the inaudible swish of fins in the lakes and rivers, the quick, cunning bodies of foxes atte to steal under my chicken coop only to be thwarted by the four feet deep fence and ce them safe as they puffed up their feathers to ward off the early spring chill

But there were some secrets it never could keep

I’d been unable to sleep, eary body begging for rest, h to slip into unconsciousness, s off the side of the bed, soles touching down onto the furry side of a Ger on her side, snuggling into one of the seven other bodies scattered acrossroo died down, chilling that space

The house was quiet as it so often was, just the heavy breathing of dogs, the snoring of the of their nails on the floor as they chased soh the forest floor in their dreams

The crackling of the dying firespace, going over to throw another log on, knowing it would be several long, cold hours before the sun teased through the aret through the night without the fire, but the dogs would start shaking The sah feet of snow like it was cotton candy But it h wood around us to keep us all as warm as anted to be

One-point-one million acres of wood, to be exact Sure, it was protected whichit doas technically a criovernment land without permission, you didn’t fuss too much about a little firewood

Ito get so to be necessary

Spring ardens and the greenhouse ready for new planting I orking froh May And then, well, it eeding and harvesting It never let up save for the winter

It had been a long, cold one, though And I foundfor the work, for the tiredness in my muscles, the bone-deep exhaustion that would make sleep possible