The Slower Road

… or … “spring is in the air” …

I took a walk at the KY Horse Park the other day. I think it was our third or fourth sunny day in a row (something we hadn’t seen in what felt like months). Each sunny day was a little warmer than the one before, and on this particular afternoon, the temperature was somewhere in the 60s. If you kept your head up, rather than looking down at all the wintery brown grass in the fields and pastures, you could see buds on the trees. And someone in some sort of odd ultralight hang-gliding contraption, flying noisily around the park.  

I did make the mistake of looking back down at the brown grass at one point, only to be faced with a remarkably large (given the weather) pile of snow lingering near the corner of Nina Bonnie Rd and Marks Lane.

For the next leg of my walk, I was determined to focus again on the trees. It was then that I heard, and then saw — flying low, slowly, and loudly — one of the World War II-era planes that lives here in Lexington and flies around with some regularity. This particular plane is an original, restored T-6 Texan, a large, single-engine aircraft used to train pilots from World War II through the 1950s. We’ve seen this plane and others from the same era flying over our neighborhood. I also have a couple of photos (below) of a replica bi-plane that I’ve seen flying over the Horse Park. We get modern jets and propeller planes flying over Lexington, of course, but to my mind these old ones sound so much more interesting.

During the tail end of such a looong cold winter as we’ve had this year, everyone’s rooting around for signs of spring. Here are a few …

1) The calendar

The annual Rolex Kentucky Three-Day Event (at the end of April, here at the KY Horse Park) is less than two months away. Which means that the preparations must be about to start. All the various tents and temporary grandstands going up for Rolex is one of the undeniable signs of spring, even if it’s hard to imagine the grass turning green and filling up with dandelions (!) by the time all the eventing horses arrive.

2) The sunshine

Today marks the second of back-to-back days of blue skies and sunshine … something we haven’t seen in weeks. AND the temperature (in the 40s) feels like a heat wave compared to the weather we’ve been having — that is, as long as you’re facing the sun and not the wind! And one must ignore the fact that this warm-feeling 40-ish is still about ten degrees below our normal for this time of year. Oh, and one must also ignore the several piles of SNOW still hanging around.

3) The plants and the birds

All of a sudden, snowdrops have sprouted and bloomed in our garden at home. The annual profusion of springtime weeds can’t be far behind. Here at the Horse Park, and elsewhere, the many songbirds are singing sweetly outside (in hopes, no doubt, of attacting bird wives).

4) The horses

Foals have been spotted outside. Need I say more?