New York City, July 23, 2014

★★★ Garbage was invisibly in bloom on 3rd Street; a sanitation truck weaved from curb to curb, through the rot-laden air. The small patches of sun were already challenging. But the clouds were surprisingly good-looking, small and loose cumulus on clean blue, and they were even more surprisingly effective against the early sun. A man sat in the little fenced yard off Prince Street and watched the passing foot traffic, the sunbeam behind his amber sunglass lenses calling more attention to his gaze than if his eyes had been uncovered. Up on the roof, out of the air conditioning, the heat was therapeutic, the brightness overwhelming in a soothing way. The afternoon sidewalks were glazed with filth, the pale ornamented face of the Bayard Building drenched in light. Out on the open pavement, the heat was baking. The west seemed to be darkening. Clouds assumed more threatening configurations for a while, but the threat held off. Then, at bath time, it arrived, with thunder that sounded throughout the apartment and rain washing down the avenue. The lightning was strobe-intense, enough to briefly stun the eye. More high and distant flashes lit the clouds lavender. Sirens and the beeping of snarled traffic joined the rumbling. A bolt appeared reflected in the eastern face of the glass apartment tower, its jaggedness overlaid with ripples.