Pruning roses on a crisp frosty morning is very satisfying. Once you have allowed the icy numbness to work its way into your hands, you can watch the blood pulsing from the thorn wounds without the distracting anxiety pain can bring. You are detached from the incision and the clean dampness of melted ice from the stem makes it all feel quite clinical. Stems, which are heavily frosted, snap through the secateurs with a thrilling crunch and crack.
Received wisdom for roses is to make a clean cut with sharp tools at such an angle that water won’t collect in the wound. Make the cut above an outward facing bud and eliminate any stems which cross or rub against one another.
As the feeling between my toes begins to leave me I spread them out within my boots to get through pain and into a state of phantom digits. From time to time I will open the collar of my jacket and let fresh cold air work down the back of my neck until I start to feel a belt of chill around my belly fat. I know it will stay with me all day even once tucked in a warm corner.
Once I stop handling the vegetation I move earth with a wheelbarrow. There is bare metal on the handle where the cheap glue-less grips long since came away. Quickly my muddy hands dry in the crisp air and and I rub the dusty callouses, less to warm them but more to feel how separate they now feel. Once the membrane on my fingers was connected more directly to my brain then any other part of my body. They were the light, artful precision tools capable of doing everything that was asked of them. Now they are bulldozers effortlessly shrugging off the daily wounds. Healing scabs are a permanent fixture for my hands now. I have forgotten the last time I didn't feel the background hum of a cracking knuckle or splintered fingertip.
One day they will start to callous on the inside and the splinters will be within the joints. I've got to stop doing this before that happens.
