The characters and the situation that inspired me belong to Annie Proulx.
Gasp
It was like steel wool: the little brush between your fingers, harsh between your fingers, and hard to grasp.
It was like the scouring wind in the dead of winter: scraping skin and leaving burn tracks.
It was like holding a match too long, and even after you feel the burn, you hang on, for the flame is beautiful.
It was like thrusting an ungloved hand through the top of a frozen water pail, water spilled onto jeans to freeze, cracked ice like glass, your knuckles bruised. But the horses need to drink, and banging the pail on the ground didn't do the trick. The ice was too thick.
But it was also like a sixteen-hand gelding and how you burrowed cold-numb fingers into the winter-thick black coat.
It was like the way the dawn can hurt you, wound with a beauty you cannot absorb. But you got to try.
Or when you jump into the water: the thrill-and-shock, thrill-and-shock-and-- gasp.