March Down Main Street, Toward Unity

Looking in the mirror, I saw a person who didn’t know where she was going or what she was doing.

My knit blouse was long, white, and long-sleeved, with two rows of ruffles on the bottom. I had on black athletic capris. On my feet were crew socks and a pair of gray New Balance walking shoes with magenta stripes. The shoes were prescribed for me by John’s Run Walk Shop, a Lexington fixture since the proprietor, John Sensenig, left his faculty position in the late 1970s in the psychology department at the University of Kentucky and followed his dream of operating a running store.

Perched on my head was a white wide-brimmed hat with a flourish of black and white ribbon. It was the kind of hat that women in Central Kentucky wear to thoroughbred races at Keeneland, and that women in the Kentucky Society, Daughters of the American Revolution often wear to the annual memorial service that closes out our state conference.

Oh, and there were the white gloves. Cotton, wrist-length white gloves.

It was the morning of July 4, 2019. I had promised my DAR sisters that I would join them for the city’s annual Independence Day Parade. Over the years, Lexington, Kentucky had built a multi-day celebration around July 4th. On July 3, the Great American Pie Contest and Ice Cream Social kicked off downtown, followed by the Patriotic Concert on the steps of Morris Hall at Transylvania University, the oldest college west of the Alleghenies.

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Photo courtesy of Lexington Chapter, NSDAR