‘The Breath of the Buffalo in the Wintertime’

It’s been a year now since my Dad moved through his final days of life, receiving hospice care on Christmas Day and for two short days after that.  I still have the notes I took each time I talked to him while he was in the hospital and rehab center.  I still have his phone number under Dad in my cell phone, though no one’s there to answer.  I still have the picture of him in my mind of how he looked when I saw him for the last time two months before he died.  His hair and beard were white and long.  The sharp pain of his passing has waned, and I find myself carrying gratitude for him, his life, and his stories.

One story he told about his childhood years was riding to the nearby town of Badger in the horse-drawn sleigh.  Grandpa would harness and hitch up the horses, and then the whole family would pile into the sleigh and cover themselves with a big buffalo robe—the tanned hide of a buffalo with the hair left on it.  Dad said it was the warmest blanket for traveling across the snow-covered prairie in an open sleigh.

We’ve been having a bit of a cold spell here in Minnesota over the past week or so—temperatures in the teens or single digits with wind chills up to 25 below zero, with last night’s actual temperature a frigid 25 below!  January weather before the Winter Solstice.  During this cold weather last Saturday, we visited a Christmas tree farm that offers horse-drawn sleigh rides (or wagon, if not enough snow) to see their buffalo.  The big, black Percherons stood in front of the hitching post, patiently waiting for the next group of bundled sight-seers.  We were not among the bundled, but the horses, the cold, and the buffalo reminded me of Dad’s story of winter prairie life.     

One buffalo was standing his ground while the others grazed or ate hay.  His moisture-laden breath wreathed his big head and froze on his muzzle like a great white beard.

“What is life?  It is the flash of a firefly in the night.  It is the breath of the buffalo in the wintertime.  It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”  –Crowfoot, Blackfoot warrior and orator

What is life?  Would we even know without the pain and poignancy of death?  Crowfoot reminds us that life is the little things that happen in our world—the flash of a firefly, the frozen breath of a buffalo, notes from a phone call, childhood stories, a sunset, and a hug good-bye.  Christmas and other holidays feel different when our loved ones are no longer in our lives—through death or by choice.  There are missing pieces that dampen the joy and celebration.  And while the sharp pain subsides with time, the loss chills our hearts in small but real ways.  So I cover myself with the buffalo robe of memories—it’s the warmest way for traversing this new path.