New York City, May 11, 2014

★★★★★ At last, in full, if perhaps briefly: clear but not vivid blue sky, invigorating or insinuating breezes, the gentle and ideal springtime. After every crosswalk, the two-year-old went running ahead, taking the full available liberty from curb to curb. A passerby’s eyeshadow glittered; the cellophane on a bouquet was momentarily blinding. Clothes and the bodies under the clothes moved with ease, relaxed or dapper, all the lightness and bareness permitted rather than required. The breeze flowed through flowing fabric, as intended. Outside the hotdog storefront, a spritz of air-conditioner mist drifted down. Why not open a window, open all the windows? The afternoon playground as half in shadow, but the two-year-old was as indifferent to sun or shade as he was to whether he had chased his borrowed basketball into the middle of some older kids’ real basketball game. The demands of thirst and of heavy squirt guns meet in a standoff at one of the concrete drinking fountains. Children with foam-dart arsenals were forming up into militias by the tall end of the climber, arranging and debating and occasionally even playing war games. When no one was looking and his brother was arguing about a game of catch, the two-year-old separated his helmet from his parked scooter and began zooming around bareheaded. A woman emerged from the open front of the brand-new wine bar to bring a container of water to her dog, waiting at the hydrant outside. The late sun made its way all the way through the smaller bedroom and the kitchen doorway to flash off the side of the rectangular knife at each stroke through the asparagus.