No one starts keeping chickens in January. At least if you live where the seasons actually take turns. Not like Florida or LA where the only difference between summer and winter is a fleece. At night. 

Lugging warm water and slogging through the snow is not many people's idea of a hobby, but if you have come to care about these feathered birds over the past nine months you show up. Or they die. 

As spring tip toes back in with her snowdrops outside the window and melting icicles on the rafters, chicken tending starts to be fun again. I for one have three broody Silkies, sitting in staunch dedication on clutches of warm eggs, as if they were recruited by Big Bird himself. In a couple of weeks I will peek into their nesting boxes to find broken egg shells, and white fluffiness. And life will begin anew. 

A friend who suffered a loss a few weeks ago was moved to see the outpouring of support from her small group. Meals, cards, hugs, comforting words all numbed the sting of an unexpected death. 

"The small group had to already be in place," she told me. "The momentum of having spent an evening together every week for a few months was enough to carry them over her threshold and past any hesitation to bud in. They know I care about them. I know they care about me."                               

It is prudent to have routines in place before it gets hard, and cold, and inconvenient. So that life does indeed stand a chance to begin anew.