New York City, February 3, 2015

★★ Thin new white accumulation lay on the top surfaces of translucent gray snowbanks, like blank highlights in an overworked pencil drawing of winter. A cheery neon-green metallic balloon lay completely crushed under black slush in the street. The sky was on its way toward brightening, with no particular urgency (shadows faded in and out on the page where that was jotted). By afternoon the sky had made it to clear blue. The ice on the fire escape creaked entertainingly underfoot. In the evening, the streetlights gleamed on the ice-glazed bricks of the churchyard wall.