Shoveling It

Now, being Irish, shit shoveling comes natural to me. I come from a long line of shit shovelers. My paternal grandfather, Spaghetti, shoveled shit on a farm in Northern Ireland well over a century ago. He saw a lot of bad shit in his other reincarnations “back home.” He shoveled a lot of other people’s shit in his lifetime in this country as a super, a laborer, and a doorman. It’s in my genes.

I got the other form of shit shoveling, the Blarney, from my slightly more refined but far more mystical maternal grandmother, Bridey Burke. Now that’s a gift that keeps on giving.

Because I’ve often found myself neck deep in shit, with the Devil ready to blow the “back on your heads” whistle.

When you spend four decades in the legal profession, you quickly learn that most creatures that you are compelled to deal with are full of shit, friends and foe. You also become used to cleaning up other creatures’ shit. Indeed, you also get used to shoveling shit, because that’s how you sell your creatures’ legally repackaged shit to the other side, and to the legal arbiters, while sifting through the other side’s less artfully repackaged shit. Because no one shovels shit better than you.

It’s a complete shit show. At the end of all of these years, it’s hard to get the shit off your hands and out from under your nails. That is the perfect cure for Onychophagia.

As a writer, I’ve been able to take that same legal skill set and refine that shit shoveling to a whole new level. I’ve raised it from a science to an art.

But who would have thought, after all of these years, that my professional life would bleed over into my present NoCo reality. Life imitates art.

Everyone of my fine, five readers know that Claire the Mule from The Claire Saga is inspired by the real and equally magical mule, the Claire of Casa Claire.

Claire and her faithful companion, Honey, spend most of their retirement life at Casa Claire freely wandering the property, eating, sleeping . . . .

and shitting. . .

often in protest.

Now, my lovely wife may have to deal with any shit that occurs within the four walls of the actual home on Casa Claire, some that may even have been caused by me, but any shit that occurs outside on the property is left for me to handle. That’ a lot of shit.

You see, my mules eat round the clock.

And those nutrients come out as quickly as they go in.

And all of that shit, ultimately gets shoveled into my trusty and worn wheelbarrow

and ends up at Hadrian’s Wall.

Where it decomposes and becomes the most fertile land on Casa Claire.

Indeed, as its compost settles in each successive row it is slowly making its way towards the house, like a nutrient shit glacier. You can see how the older rows have gone to seed with the high hardy grass that rises above the snow and serves as a delicious natural snack to the mules even during winter.

Shit flows full circle as Casa Claire.

Well yesterday was a record seven wheelbarrows of shit shoveling for this old shit shoveler.

Leaving most of my body feeling like its been through a shit storm.

Luckily, my mind and fingertips can share a little more shit with my fine, five readers as I sit here before my keyboard, waiting for my Relief Factor to resurrect this old body one more day.

I’ll still manage to cuddle my kitties and make my rounds, and hopefully get to this week’s fruit and veggie prep, so that there is plenty of high quality shit to make it to Hadrian’s Wall and these blog pages.

I hope you fine, five readers get to do something relaxing and fun. Like maybe read a book (or five).

And no matter what else we do today, let us make it a great one.