It Was Amazing How It

The Window Gave Onto A View Of Dove-gray Roofs And Balconies, Each One Containing The Same Cracked Flowerpot And Sleeping Feline. It Was As If The Entire City Of Paris Had Agreed To Abide By A Single Understated Taste. Each Neighbor Was Doing His Or Her Own To Keep Up Standards, Which Was Difficult Because The French Ideal Wasn't Clearly Delineated Like The Neatness And Greenness Of American Lawns, But More Of A Picturesque Disrepair. It Took Courage To Let Things Fall Apart So Beautifully.

Pregnancy Humbles Husbands. After An Initial Rush Of Male Pride They Quickly Recognise The Minor Role That Nature Had Assigned Them In The Drama Of Reproduction.

She Understood That Her Heart Operated On Its Own Instructions, That She Had No Control Over It Or, Indeed, Anything Else.

But That Was In The Days When They Expected Perils To Come From Without, And Nothing Made Less Sense By That Time Than A Survival Room Buried In A House Itself Becoming One Big Coffin.

In The End We Had The Pieces Of The Puzzle, But No Matter How We Put Them Together, Gaps Remained, Oddly Shaped Emptinesses Mapped By What Surrounded Them, Like Countries We Couldn't Name.