Browning tar, a rote of car zoom noises around my window. The sun sets in a distance, a lot earlier than before, to a now conditioned amazement. Afternoon and night share a neighbourly block on the street of a dying year. Tick, tock, the clock hand counts the moments again in memories of times gone before. At a different time but in a similar pose, time counted down. The geese quacked. The refrigerator hummed creaky tunes in the middle of night. Ice formed into layers of sweat balls around the glass, and everything else stayed still.

The world has not changed since then, or has it? Many months of movements follow each other in steps of ease, and texts, and work, and revolts. And here we are, another winter, another dark evening at four o’ clock. It is a short remove from those quiet times, just two years ago, in the sober remove of a rustic village, but here it is. A year winds down with the last paces of its easing rote, crank and all.