Although the view from this window still bears a bit too much snow to be terribly inspiring, down in the valley there is grass growing around the crocuses and daffodils, and all the birds are just that much more manic. A contrast from the occasional fits of song I'm hearing in the woods around home. I did hear a wren on this morning's walk. They always sound a little crazy anyway. But it's all enough to make a one-time morris dancer haul out and polish his bells. Ah, for those heady days when the beard was brown and the shin splints were just a temporary blip on the weekend's tour. I knew I'd recover by Tuesday in time for practice. The important thing was to have lift in the single-step and snap at the corners. And keep smiling. Morris dancers always dance their best for other morris dancers, because they're the only ones who really care. And it's as competitive (for the boys, at least) as any geek sport. We're like those song birds out there, flashing our plumage (hankies and baldricks), leaping and showing like sacrificial ungulates. Of course, everyone knows how that incredible facility with waving hankies and jingling bells is dead-useful for attracting a desirable mate. Even better when the sticks come out. And occasionally there's blood, although more often from black fly bites than from a stick contusion. Actually, on reflection, the beer may be the best part. Dunno...
    Anyhow, that was then. Now, I just have a toe in the morris water, and I have a pretty good idea who's really watching. I like those tunes, too. And morris dancing is one of the few places where an accordian is a respectable instrument. You've probably heard the joke:
    A morris musician goes into a pub and leaves his accordian on the back seat of his car. MUCH later he comes out of the pub and, sure enough, the back window on his car has been smashed, and there on the seat of the car there are now two accordians.
    But I like accordians. I also like banjos and bagpipes. And morris dancing. Yet I still managed to find a mate and father offspring. Spring is in the air and nature is full of surprises.