Spring

May arrived incognito.  Tulips, pink ones that commemorate a friend’s passing and yellow ones to reflect springtime sunshine, were stooped over like and old man leaning on his cane as they carried inches of heavy, sleet laden snow.  Widespread clouds reached their arms as high as thunderheads while dragging knuckles on grassy ground, budding flowers and greening leaves.  Hanging baskets had to be taken from their shepherds’ hooks and decorative chains to wait inside while winter exhaled through half of spring.

Drizzling rain that arrived on Thursday looks like it will now take the Monday clipper bound for parts east of here to deliver more shivers. The same cold rain visited Churchill Downs until moments before the call of “Riders Up!”.  In that race several pounds of mud from the storied track, where Seabiscuit and Secretariat ran to fame, would be deposited on jockeys’ goggles, owners’ silks and horses’ nostrils, ears and powerful piston legs.  Orb ran to wear the rose blanket and claimed the day in early May that usually confirms that spring has sprung.  Neither the well adorned hats nor the deep red roses looked like spring under the sullen gray sky - but the thick air could not douse the day for the trainer who gets to smell the roses for the first time after a lifetime spent with Kentucky horses.

For the first time, maybe for as long as it’s been held, the Brookside Art Fair cancelled Friday evening when the rain was steady and the wind chill would not rise close to freezing.  Even on Saturday, the artists looked more like the scientific team that hunkers down in Antarctica each winter.  Most folks chose to have their spirits rise far above the dictates of the dismal day.  Bright colors and whimsical creations inspired laughter and camaraderie under the tents where attendance grew in spite of a day more apt for a fireplace and warm pajamas. 

Major league baseball in Kansas City - this year the Royals are indeed playing like a major league team - was cancelled long before the umpires would arrive at Kauffman Stadium.  On this day, there would not be any way for a pitcher to warm an arm in the conditions delivered to the home town boys on the third day of May.  This team has more fun than any team of Royals in the last twenty-five years.  Losing a Friday night game with fireworks and dancing fountains is a game not easily made up on a rain date.  Finn, whose birthday gifts included an outing to the ball park - now cancelled, finished a mega Lego project and strummed some chords on his electric guitar.  Baseball was delayed.

With all outdoor activities off the list, we decided on a distinctly winter activity, a movie.  The Plaza was teeming with people and the theater was teeming with teens.  Friday night, date night - well, maybe flash mob night.  I guess date night is another anachronism - now relegated to the quaint corners of memory where the past is always prettier than living it actually was.  The movie, The Company You Keep, is a story about the lives of some radicals from the 1960s and 70s whose passionate pursuit of protest resulted in the death of an innocent bank employee.  A low ebb for a manic time.  After the movie and walking to the car, dodging the drizzle as much as possible, the cold damp chill of the night seemed to echo the emotion of the worst moments of that truculent time.

Today the tulips were standing tall again.  The Royals rallied late and won in the bottom of the tenth inning - now seven games above 500.  Billy Butler, Alex Gordon and Salvy Perez are all good candidates for sons and grandsons to emulate.  For a few minutes late this afternoon the sky brightened enough that some shadows stretched out beside the trees and houses.  Tomorrow, the promise is that the sun will reemerge and burn away the foggy mire.  Hanging baskets are hanging on their shepherds’ hooks and chains.  Pots of ferns sit open to the sky beyond the cover of either porch roof.  The planter filled with pansies has retaken its appointed place beside Chauncey, the three foot tall rabbit who holds dominion over the flowers and shrubs beyond the back porch.

There are days when the weather tromps its big foot down upon the lever that determines daily attitude.  The cold and damp of this extended, interminable winter has tried to push that lever to its limit.  It has failed.  Tomorrow there will be sun.  Tomorrow there will be smiles, high fives, and music.  Leaves will turn green and tulips will glow luminescent.  Tomorrow there will be spring.

--td