What came first? The chicken or the...

When really, this is about embracing the next iteration of your story.

Jan 19, 2024

The morning is brisk yet ethereal as I glance out my kitchen window. A lace of fog blankets the pastures. Coffee percolates and notes of hazelnut drift towards me. I take deep breaths in and, with the roll of my shoulders, shake off the weight of sleep.

A soft yellow and orange bundle of fur brushes against my ankles. Peering down, I find Lemon blinking up at me. Her meow is demanding for the early morning hour. Sighing, I scoop the kitten into my arms. Lemon nips and purrs against my chest. I’ve never had a cat before. I peek through the kitchen window at the lumbering shapes meandering through the vapor. Then again, I’ve never had any of these animals before.

We pull up to the YMCA of the Rockies’1 lobby tucked into a valley of Estes Park. My heart leaps at the snow-capped mountains running the length of the western horizon. I breathe in the pine-filled air and feel at home.

I’ve always felt grounded in the mountains. The mountains are still. I’m envious of their sturdiness when I feel my life once again going adrift.

My husband goes to check us in, our two kids following close behind. I linger on the lobby’s wide front porch, watching as the sun’s silver light spears through the clouds and dips behind the peaks.

We’re in the middle of another relocation, another PCS. This time we’re moving from Ohio to New Mexico. I recall the way we laid out the plans. How I wanted to spend time in Colorado, to see family and friends well before settling into another new home and another new community. I schemed and plotted for a family trip to the Rocky Mountain National Park.

Sheepishly, I presented my idea to Ryan, “Want to spend the weekend tucked away in the mountains with me and the kids?”

And now, as I trace the rising edges, I’m so glad he said yes. I already feel my shoulders loosening, my jaw slacking, and the tension I felt for the move fade into the brisk air.

Moments later, we settled into our room. There’s nothing spectacular about it. No TV, limited internet service, beige covers, and a white fan tucked into the corner. The kids scramble onto one of the queen beds and leap to the other.

I wiggle my way past their squeals and booming laughs to the back patio door. The sky’s cornflower blue now pools into a deeper indigo, summer’s light fading to a mere outline against the Rockies.

I’m joined by Ryan and our son, who, like any other 6-year-old, starts rapid-firing questions about what our next assignment will be like.

Slumping into the wooden Adirondack chairs, he launches them forward. “What does our house in New Mexico look like? Where will I go to school? Do we have a backyard? Is there actually grass there? Will I melt from the heat? Do the dogs like it there?”

I let Ryan answer most of these. He’s already moved into the house we’re renting and has been living in New Mexico for the past 3 months while the kids and I make our way there. We’ve spent those months apart, him unpacking and starting a new job, and me solo-parenting back in Ohio as the kids' school year ended.

This. This trip is what we needed to come together. A deep, blissful sense of gratitude washes over me.

Ryan wraps his arm around our son and unravels the details of the new place from the overgrown pasture, the trees for the kids’ swing, the dirt that settles into every nook and cranny of the home, and an abandoned chicken coop.

My ears perk up, and I play what-ifs in my head. What if I build a garden? What if I take horseback riding lessons at the stables across the street? What if I learn to bake sourdough?

I wonder what kind of life awaits me. After 10 years of moving, it’s like “trying lives on,”2 at each new location, just to see which one finally sticks. But then orders come in and the cycle starts again.

You say goodbye to one home, shed the life that accompanied it, and with the turn of the page, you earnestly try to pick up another. You begin again.

Interrupting my thoughts, I speak my next imagining out loud.

“What if we get chickens?”

The time is 7:00 AM. I drop Lemon off in her pack-n-play, once used for babies, now a refuge for the kitten to eat away from the prying mouths of dogs. I jump into my jeans, yank on wool socks, and throw on my husband’s Carhart jacket. Turns out January is still bone-chilling cold in New Mexico.

We’ve now lived in the ranch-style home for close to 7 months, a little longer depending on who you’re asking. What started as make-believe has now become a reality. 3 hens are waiting to be let out of their coop. Sheep and goats are waiting to be fed. The ice in their water troughs needs to be broken.

Turning towards the mirror, I let myself wonder, can I make it as a farmer? Doubts creep and settle into the pit of my stomach. I’ve never been a farmer before, never thought of owning a hobby farm, and never thought I would make it as a cowgirl. Knowing that there’s so much to learn is nerve-racking. Realizing we’re only here for a season carries a wave of urgency–soak it in while you can Jess. Caring for livestock is intimidating, to say the least.

Yet there’s a calling thrumming within me. I want to follow this stirring and see what path it takes me down. I can’t deny this yearning to sink into the natural rhythms of this Western world we stumbled upon.

I make my way to the back door and tuck my feet into my husband's old work boots, caked in mud from the previous day. As I slide the glass doors open, the January chill awakens my senses. I saunter through the backyard, listen to the crunch of frosted grass beneath my boots, and start my chores.

First, I throw open the red chicken coop door. The hens cluck and plop down around me, then dash to feast on bugs hidden in the decaying earth. I toss some feed into the neighboring grass for them to peck. Next, I push the wheelbarrow towards the stacks of hay bales. Using pliers, I unsnap the wire and load a couple up. Impatiently, the goats and sheep bleat out as I wheel past their pen towards the steel gate that opens to the pastures.

A rumble of their feet pounds the cold dirt. All nine goats and eight sheep give me a wide berth to push the wheelbarrow through. Their baas ring out in unison as they await breakfast. So eager, I laugh. Hay clings to my clothes as I toss each flake into separate piles for them to munch. One by one, they knock into each other, each finally settling on a pile, a murmur of chews.

A sheep boldly steps in front of me and softly nibbles the hay from my hands. Taking his lead, I gingerly reach and pat his head. I’m doing it, I’m embracing the opportunity the transition of last year has paved for me.

My breath puffs out in front of me as I greet each animal. As I welcome this new iteration of my life. “Hello, good morning friends.”

This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in the series "Hello"

YMCA of the Rockies has two retreat locations. We stayed at the Estes Park Center. Military friends, the YMCA of the Rockies has a two-night military package you can book for a discount. Plus, your military ID gets you into the national parks for Free. However, you’ll need to make a reservation to enter Rocky Mountain NP.

I can’t get the song “Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version)” out of my head. And this line, in particular, I’ve been obsessively mulling over.