Sean Clancy

The Kentucky Derby is over. The Iroquois Steeplechase is looming. The Preakness gate is locked and ready. Saratoga is on the horizon.

Time flies.

Post time: 9:00. A long awaited coup about to be unleashed. Gamblers, pundits, fans and scribes wait for the moment. The Saturday moment. The race of the day.

Things learned, questioned and pondered at the Middleburg Spring Races Saturday…

59 degrees and raining. Two old geldings, one dark bay, one white, huddle under a tree in the front field, heads hung low, noses inches from the ground. The rain creates a sheen across their backs. 

Nothing like a winner. When I rode races, I couldn’t understand the enjoyment, the interest of the owners. How could they get so excited, they’re not riding the horse? Now, that I can’t ride, don’t ride, I understand.

52 degrees and sunny.

Beautiful Monday morning after a few days traveling and a few days racing. It’s spring time, racing season, horses on the grass, miles on the car.

“Does he have any allergies?”

Miles chimes in, “Not that we know of.”

The nurse laughs.

He’s making friends.

The nurse asks, “Miles, do you know what surgery you’re having?”

“Hernia.”

43 degrees and cloudy.

Well, that’s what my phone says, my eyes tell it differently.

The light gleans through the windows like knives heaved at a cutting board, flashes at each window, upstairs, downstairs, hallway, kitchen, an orange and blue whirl coming from the east. I hit the button on the coffee maker, grab my phone and my camera, still in slippers, and scramble outside, knowing that it’s one of those sunrises. Over and just to the left of the bank barn, deflecting through the trees, cutting through the water tower in the distance, somehow leaping over the mountain range, the frame.