New York City, June 22, 2017

★★★ The morning light was ransacking upper-floor apartments but the playground was shaded and cool. Spirits were up; the five-year-old was moved, for the first time in memory, not to loiter by the far fence but to play on the climber. Two children collided at the gate between the inner and outer playgrounds, with an audible thump and then tears. There were enough clouds to mellow the midday light. An ice cream truck jammed its way through the crosswalk, making a turn. The late afternoon was comfortable in the forecourt, but upstairs the lowering sun and the stove combined to make the air conditioner necessary for the first time all day. A pearly glare covered the west, and when that subsided, the darkening sky was scrawled with pink tracery.