“Babe, I’m gonna take a walk with the boys down bottom to check on the horse and donkey,” I said, sauntering out the front door after supper to find Sean and Aaron tossing a yellow ball back and forth in the lush grass in front of Mom’s house—her place adjoining ours.
It’s a beautiful spring evening. The golden light is glorious.
We ambled down the caliche driveway past Uncle Mark and Aunt Bessie’s, then Pappaw and Mamaw’s new place, commenting on the straight line of fence Pappaw is having installed. We talked about the sheep and how nice it will be to have another paddock for their consumption. It’s remarkable how animals change your view of the landscape—how you begin to see every patch of grass as feed. I sometimes tell Sean to bring the sheep up to the garden and chicken yard to convert the poison ivy into lamb chops—and they do. They devour it, choosing poison ivy over premium Bermuda every time. I guess it’s true what the old song says, “Little lambs eat ivy.”
As we made our way past Uncle Abraham and Aunt Hannah’s, the sunset cast its golden rays toward us, backlighting the verdant peach trees we paused to inspect—their green fruit belying the luscious succulence they promise.
Next, we passed the Linzer place, beautifully framed behind an undulating sea of oats already catching and refracting the light, though still green. I couldn’t resist taking a picture. Then we found ourselves marveling at another orchard, answering questions about pomegranates and peaches, discussing how old the trees must be before they can safely tolerate the undergrazing of the sheep flock.
Just then, as we passed the mulberry tree, nine-year-old Aaron dashed forward—his red bangs bouncing—leaping to snatch a branch and pull it down to eye level, inspecting whether the red, blistered berries were turning black yet. He knows these trees. He and his cousins have spent hours in their branches, painting their faces blue and filling their stomachs with something far more entertaining than cobbler—though they’re pretty fine in a cobbler on a Sunday afternoon in May. These are the same mulberry trees I was climbing when I was nine.
“Oh, Daddy, look over there at that wagon—I like that one,” Aaron said as we turned the corner toward the old stack yards.
“Look—look,” Sean said, and we stopped to watch a spectacle unfolding in the sky above the hayfield. Scissor-tailed flycatchers, their seven-inch coattails streaming behind them, darted and dove—half a dozen of them—like tiny angels waging war against mosquitoes in the heavens. “Look at that, boys.” The birds’ peach-colored breasts caught the evening sun at that height, the sun already beyond our view.
The smell of horses drew us the rest of the way into the long corridors of pens and stalls in the Heritage Mustangs barn.
The smell was just as it was in my earliest memories on Rehoboth Ranch—the blended fragrance of hay and horses, leather and saddle oil. And then there is that other scent the nose cannot detect, but the spirit inhales like oxygen: excitement, adventure, dreams on horseback.
“I wonder if your horse will come up to you,” Aaron said to his big brother as we moved closer to the pen where Sean’s mustang waited.
Through mornings and evenings of faithful training and gentling—of slow trust-building over the past week—the mare had learned to lunge and turn and now welcomed a good pat, even an embrace around the neck. It was almost hard to believe this was a wild mustang that once had to travel twenty miles for a daily drink.
Aaron and I stayed back and watched, our hearts quietly leaning in—hoping, but not wanting to build expectations too high. Sean walked gently, averting his eyes to avoid direct confrontation, easing her anxiety. He stood beside the corral panel, and without hesitation, the horse gave a slight shudder—almost a shrug that said, “Oh well, here’s my new buddy”—and sauntered right up to him, lowering her head for a pat.
She already appeared in better flesh than when we purchased her just a week ago, and her spirit seemed calm, peaceful—even a little trusting.
We walked over to check on Aaron’s donkey, Bridie.
She looked back with quizzical speculation—almost indifference—like a professor eyeing a new pupil, reminding all of us that, unlike horses, she does not depend on maudlin affection.
We laughed and moved on, looking over the horses in their various stages of development.
We headed back home, talking about the Muscovy ducks roosting in the trees—and therefore reproducing, since they keep their nests off the ground—and the geese that had not yet managed to preserve their eggs from predators long enough for a successful hatch. We turned left by the wheat field and made our way back up the lane.
“Look at the bluff, Daddy,” Sean said. “Isn’t it pretty? I don’t remember it ever being this pretty.”
Though the sun had set, iridescent clouds cast hues of salmon and magenta and peach and gold across the bluff.
“What shall I name her?” Sean asked.
“Well, we’ve read through all the suggestions—there were some good ones,” I said.
“Yes,” he replied. “A lot of good ones. Did any of them click for you?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe not.”
“Well, let’s talk about our favorites—the ones we’ve been discussing since the ride home.” We narrowed it down to three: Chica, Doro, and Lyric. Lyric was one I had just thrown out that evening.
“What does that mean?” Aaron asked.
“A lyric is the words of a song,” I told him.
“Yeah,” Sean said quietly. “And our life is supposed to be like a song. So she’s a part of that song.”
The three of us grew quiet as we walked on.
All at once, Aaron burst out, “Daddy, look—look! Do you see them? The lightning bugs are out! That’s the first I’ve seen!”—and he darted off ahead of us.
“I think I like that,” Sean said.
“What?”
“Lyric. I think that’s what we should call her.”
“ Try it,” I tell him, “Say it out loud: I’m gonna run down to the barn and saddle up Lyric.”
We both smiled at each other. It felt right to me, too.
“It feels real good, actually, Sean,” I admitted.
Aaron came bounding back. “I’ve got one! I’ve got one!”
I pulled out my camera and started snapping, and every time I thought I’d missed the glow, I’d look back and find I had caught it at just the right moment. Oh, these moments—these flashes of inspiration, these small glows of light in a world so often dimmed with gray. I tousled Aaron’s red hair.
“You’d better let it go, buddy. It’s gonna get too hot in your cupped hands.”
“But I want to put it in a jar when I get home,” he said.
“There are plenty more up at the house,” I told him. He opened his hand, and for a moment the firefly lingered against his palm. Then he gave a small shake, and it flitted into the night—flickering with the glow of spring, and inspiration, and beauty, and farm life, and family.
“Well, boys,” I said, “you run on into the house. I’m gonna sit out here in this beautiful air and work on my newsletter.”
They skipped ahead and met up with four-year-old Ella on her bike. Her two older brothers ran on either side of her as she pedaled hard to keep up—all the way into the warm glow of our front porch.
It’s a beautiful spring evening.
The golden light is just glorious.
We’d love to hear from you—if you like the name Lyric, drop a comment below.