These days nothing feels as it should.

There is an off-ness in the gusts of wind, in the bad news that I read from the local paper while the dog pees on the dying bush that is his 4.30 a.m. go-to spot.

I’m going to have to find a new morning routine for the two of us.

After lunch, I walk around the rail station. Hail comes and goes. The pigeons line up in two neat rows.

Who knows why.

It’s what we do, I suppose.

From Kindergarten. Line up. Calm down. Be good.

And we keep at it. Mindlessly, when our thoughts are turned to the blind corners of depression. When things we touch wither and die.

We line up. We wait. We follow peripheral bodies. We seek comfort in the meaningless crowd.

We behave.