On Sunday, an hour-long hike in the hills with Michael engaged all seven senses:

•kinesthetic: climbing up the Rhodes-Metcalf, up to the Gretch, back down the Corwen and ultimately linking to the Barkan
•auditory: jays jabbering in trees and bushes all along the trail; rustle of small fauna in the undergrowth
•organic: heart pounding harder, breathing more labored until, at last, the downhill
•olifactory: every spring smell now convergent–sage, greasewood, and farther away and below, orange blossoms
•tactile: rolling a snapped-off sprig of sage between my fingers (and, prontissimo, back to olifactory)
•visual: the folds of the canyon, switchbacks faintly etched in the foothills ahead and up, the valley view–a dozen kinds of verdure from the recent rain, quilt of orchards, shimmer of Lake Casitas a dozen miles distant, and closer in, the brick red of the track encircling kelly-green velvet
•gustatory: all of it, drunk down gratefully

Then, in a multisensory overload, we came off the trail near the manure pit at Hunter Barn, to hear (laughter, a fugue of talking, jangling spurs) and then see four freshman girls jogging from the barns to brunch, their morning ride over, their horses groomed and put away.

Michael: “That’s youth for ya: running in jeans and boots.”