New York City, March 4, 2015

★★★ The early sunrise and the ambient albedo of the new snow sent wakening light around the edges of the blinds, despite the overcast sky. Men with shovels were out breaking up the thick old curbside ice, levering up a huge gray slab like demolition rubble. The opening notes of “In Bloom” looped mordantly in the mind at the thought of the thaw. The MTA’s recorded message about cold and flu season played asynchronously on the opposite platforms, bounding off floor tiles evenly covered in a damp shine. A vast gray lake filled the corner by the cupcake shop downtown. The fresh whiteness headed swiftly toward slush-gray or soot-black, where it wasn’t headed to oblivion. As twilight approached, a light and still falsely springlike rain fell, making wet spots on the — when did this happen? — bare and dry bricks of the forecourt.