Paint me Purple

Harvest. Happens once a year, or twice if are like me-following the season from hemisphere to hemisphere, south to north to grab two. I go through autumn twice, and haven't seen the fresh light of spring in awhile. Long gone too are the days of a perfect manicure. Not one to always have a the fresh polish, or a French tip, but still like to take care, and be presentable. Well, for at least half of the year, my hands look somewhat like this:

Ghastly, no? I do have to admit, this picture was taken around Halloween, so I was willing to give it an especially good show at the purple, the cracked, the short nail with endless stain underneath. How on earth you say, does one's hand get this way? Cleaning. Shoveling. Endless washing. Sorting.  Sanitizing. Punching down. More and more and more wiping, suds, & cleaning. Notice a pattern here? So much of the job is making sure everything is spotless and just so, which makes for an endless day of having wet hands, and all the dryness that comes with it, insert the cracking. Tie that in with shoveling,

Punching down (mixing the grape cap at the top with the juice or wine),

And sorting,

And I can look like this:

Yes, even purple toes. This year, at Scherrer Winery, it was all manual tasks thru harvest. Everything, hands on, callous-causing, honest work. And I loved it.