New York City, April 5, 2017

★★★ Light broke through in the sky but the river remained lost in a blurry brown fog, as if the bottom of the new day hadn’t loaded properly and needed to be refreshed. The five-year-old had to be talked out of wearing shorts, and he then looped back to suggest trading his glasses for sunglasses: “But it’s sunny outside. A little.” The schoolyard was in a frenzy; a tennis ball was being fired in long ballistic throws over the heads of the children. Kindergarteners wheeled and sparred. There was fog in the east, too, confusing the growing daylight. What had presented itself as the sun’s inevitable triumph became a cloudy rout at noon. Not till deep in the afternoon did unimpeded blue shine down. The walk to the subway was the clear-lit picture of what would have been a fine day if it had happened on time. Even then there was a murkiness in the west, till suddenly that dullness swelled with a gaudy pink glow and its shapelessness resolved into intricate, illuminated textures.