I'm NOT complaining

It being 10 degrees, windy, and all, I was starting to piss and moan about the cold this morning.
That was until I saw these guys out clamming.
I may be outside all morning, but I’m not literally sinking my hands and feet into cold, unwelcoming mud.
I know that mud. I grew up trudging across the flats of Middle Bay. That mud clings to you like burrs in a field. It gets into the cracks of your skin and tints your hands four shades darker.
But I know this from summer months. Then, you could just jump in and swim it off. Yippee!
My friend, Rick, was telling me about winter clamming when he was a kid.
“It was a matter of survival,” he said.
Rick, his father, and brothers went clamming to earn enough to put food on the table. (Half a bushel yields about a gallon of shucked clams – that’s about 80 bucks wholesale.)
He remembers clamming one winter day. His gloves weren’t keeping his hands warm enough and he was complaining. His father gave Rick his gloves and he continued on, barehanded.
Barehanded!
So I have respect for winter clammers and I appreciate them showing me that Everything is Relative.
I have respect for winter water, too.
My brother and I used to go iceberg-hopping with friends. We were a band of dumbasses, I guess you could say!
The tides break up the ice into table-size chunks. And at high tide, they float around in loose groups. If conditions are right, you can jump from iceberg to iceberg.
It’s fun, until you fall in.
I fell in once or twice (yes, I am a slow learner) and found out how quickly five layers of warmth can become fifty pounds of ice cold.
Kinda scary. I was glad I wasn’t over my head.
It took a long time to warm up.

So now, like I said, I try not to complain! But I do love visiting barns with heated tack rooms!