Slow Awakenings: Spring at the Barn'

The coming of spring is a slow awakening--details unfurl, one at a time, like an opening flower. I live in South Provo--just around the corner from my house, fields and pasture open in to marshland, then the open water of Utah Lake. Migratory birds will grace these shores for a few weeks at a time in spring. In late February as I drive to work, I will see the first calf of spring, standing on wobbly legs, warm air steaming off its little body, wrapped in mist that eases from lake to field. In pagan Celtic society, Imbolc, the holy days of late January and early February, marked the beginning of spring and calving and lambing season. Such birthing was the first hope of spring.

The geese start returning at about this time as well. We see the slow awakening at the barn as well. Mornings    begin a little warmer. The hoses, usually frozen, thaw out a little sooner; the layer of ice on the top of water pails is thinner and more easily broken. Ice turns to mud then firmer earth. When March winds blow down from the canyons and shake the trees at the perimeter of Shauna's farm, the horses are skittish, easily excited. The mares begin to cast longing glances at the stallion.

 If there are pregnant mares, now is the time we look out for the birthing of foals. Niamh and I have never seen a birth--but a few times we've arrived when a foal was about 12 hours old (they always seem to come at night!). We've petted the soft head of one of these babies, watched them stagger around the stall, looking for Mom and nourishment. There's that soft low nicker the mares make that seems to say, "Come and eat. Get warm. Stay close." A quiet hush surrounds foal and mare as the baby suckles hungrily; it always brings me back to nursing my own babies, makes me recall that deep contentment and peace of taking time out from the busy tasks of life to sit still, feed my child, and look into her face. My son came to me during Imbolc as the geese were returning to Utah Lake; my daughter came on the cusp of summer and autumn as the geese were wheeling in formations over the fields, preparing for their journey south.

My daughter and I have been coming to the barn on Sunday mornings for almost a year now. She's been riding at Shauna Hatch's for six years. I used to watch my little 4th-grader lope around the arena or take low jumps with my heart in my throat. Now, she can handle and ride one of the biggest horses in the barn and loves to jump. When  a horse she's riding gets skittish, she can handle the situation. I am convinced this will help her weather "the storms of life."

As I dump out water buckets and refill them, and as I muck stalls, I think of these things, listen to the horses breathing, chomping, snorting, nickering, bugling. They bang their feeding buckets. There's the occasional skirmish. Tasha has taught Niamh to fill the big nets with hay. Niamh is really become proficient at this. She did much of it today because Tasha had tendinitis in her hand. She commented that Niamh worked really hard this morning and how a few weeks ago Niamh's  would have been hurting--but Niamh is stronger and more in shape for this kind of chore than she was just a weeks ago.

I had my own little moment of triumphant as well--in spite of the fact I've not been doing yoga as much lately, I stuck my left leg up in the stir-up, and swung my right leg over with more ease than I have ever done. I was in more control of my body instead of just hurling it up over the poor horse and nearly throwing myself and the saddle off (this happened once!).

What I love most about time down at the barn is working alongside my daughter. And now I'm learning to ride as well--oh, I'll never be as accomplished as that girl is on a horse, but we can now share this--all the mud, the poop, cold feet, sore muscles--it's been worth it to spend time with Niamh. The hawk circling the field, wind shaking the trees, yearlings thundering across the field for the sheer joy of movement, and my daughter moving in her own dance into womanhood--slow awakenings, spring at the barn, freeing me from the fear of aging and death, teaching me to flow gently into what lies ahead.