By VERLYN KLINKENBORG
Published: July 18, 2008
For the past few hours, the wind has been rising and falling, the
precursor of a storm coming in from the west. When the wind climbs, a
kind of elation blows through the house — it’s the hushing sound of
the leaves outside and the way the breeze sweeps the floors and lifts
the curtains and slams the doors. The dogs snap to and look around
when it gusts. And when the wind drops, it seems to drop us — the dogs
and me — into the trough of an ordinary summer day.
I spent a humid morning recently in the barnyard with the farrier, who
was shoeing Remedy, my quarter horse. Remedy was dozing the way a
customer sometimes dozes in a barber’s chair. First one hoof, then
another. Heel and toe trimmed and rasped and the shoe nailed home,
followed by more rasping. The other horses stood in the corral, lower
lips drooping in the heat. A twist of wind came across the pasture, up
from the highway, stirring the sumac along the fenceline. The farrier
stopped and stretched his back. Remedy shifted his feet and looked
intently at the mares. I turned my face into the wind and recoiled the
lead rope.
The breeze this afternoon is like respiration, in and out pretty
steadily with a prolonged sigh now and then. In the pauses, when the
wind is still, I can feel the expectation of a storm building. This
isn’t simply the quiet of an afternoon. It’s the quiet in which
something is about to happen.
I hope it’s a good storm, a high wind, rain slanting across the
pastures, geese splashing in the sudden puddles, chickens huddled
inside their house trying to keep the wind from getting under their
feathers. For a moment, the house I’m in seems to inflate, to fill
with air that was just outside a few seconds ago. For a moment, it
feels like a sail filling, lifting, as though this cranky old
farmhouse might loose its mooring and reach toward the sea.