Inside

It snowed on March 14. I sat inside and worked most of the day, staring at the wet flakes mixing with sleet. A March snow is almost always heavy, the clouds lighter with the spring sun behind them.

It was easy to get out of bed, and though I didn't have to go to the office, I was up and staring out the window by 7. Cooking breakfast a few minutes later. But then frustrated that the heart of the storm would miss and swing north to the Catskills, which had already been on my mind for days. They'd get three feet. We'd get four inches in the city. The storm had swung west in the middle of the night.

Maybe a residual childhood feeling. No fun to know that you've missed out on a big one. That the snow won't even get over your shoe-tops, let alone your knees.

A trip to the bookstore and a pie shop my consolation prize and my only exercise. I walked to Unnameable, which was totally empty except for the guy behind the counter. And looked at books that I'd never read if i actually decided to buy them. Theory, mostly. Impenetrable to me as ever.

I had five books in my bag. I took them to the pie shop with me. And ate a curried potato pie and a cup of coffee. A family came in: two parents who looked like they were working from home due to the weather and their two kids. The little girl kept marching in her snow pants all around the restaurant. Behind the counter. The woman who I think owns the pie shop kept grabbing her.

The parents were busy looking at their phones. Or maybe someone had convinced them to be the kind of parents who let their kids roam. Make them independent.

I walked back in the snow, which had changed temporarily into rain. Got back to the apartment and did some more work before passing out on the couch for three hours. When I woke up, there was no chance I'd move to get to work out. Instead, I wrote for hours into the night, trying to spin something together. Instead felt sluggish, like the words were just going to have to come out when they were going to come out.

Ate peanut butter. And more peanut butter. Drank milk and stood by the window, which leeched cold air into the apartment. I looked out at the New York skyline slice visible from our apartment and waited for something to explode. Not literally, or at least, I think not literally. But some idea to just pop into the holes on either side of my head.

I thought of being back up at the cabin, where they were getting buried in snow. Drifts and winds. The center of the storm passing directly over the chimney of the cabin, smoking silently. It would have been easier to be stagnant there, instead of staring at the necklace of lights.