October 7

The light no longer reaches the far wall. It comes in low this time of year, refuses to fill the room the way it did in summer — and settles, instead, where I’ve stopped looking.

There’s a kindness in that. The corner by the door has learned to stay cool. The shade is no longer something lost but something kept.

The machines make their own morning. They don’t wait for the sun’s permission. And I have, at last, stopped counting the hours I used to owe the day.