Because it scares the fuck out of me. The pall that is always there. The shadow that never leaves. The ever present core of it the you carry every day. The fragility, the mark. The thin skin and bruised veins. The slow everything. The whittling away. the vacumnof breadth, and strength and flexibility and endurance. The cage that cannot be unlocked. The wounds that cannot be healed. And you can’t smell it, not yet, but it’s there.

I sleep on the couch, in the front room, where nobody ever sits. The large window looks out on to the drive and the houses across the road, which leads to the golf course where you have never played, behind them, the mountain, where you have never hiked or skied.

In the Pantry, jars of maraschino cherries you will never eat, racks of spices you will never use, but never throw out