Then the cold came...

It's going to hit the zeros this weekend. I knew it was inevitable. It always is. I steel myself inside two shirts, a jacket, and a coat. The true winter is unavoidable. In the few days before the freeze, I'm still possessed by crippling delusion that somehow, someway, I can enter spring.

Cold signifies waiting. Waiting signifies isolation. Isolation eventually breeds madness. I know this. I know this well. Cabin fever sets in. The last subtlety on Earth. It's too easy to fall into. The helpless four a.m. vigilance, the furious attention to trivial projects. The pacing. The idea of getting food abhorred due to the inevitable contact with wind.

Twenty-five degrees isn't supposed to be balmy.

Spring becomes a myth. A Zeus or a Saturn. Pounding softly in the background of everything, affecting nothing. Songs on the radio about summer only rub salt in the wound. It's not quite torture, but it's right on the cusp.