When the sun sets early and the wind turns cold, it's time to think of the future again. You do it at night with the help of alcohol. Outside the front window, there's the moon out there. It's cold and yellow-white, above the building across the street.

The moon speaks to you through its silence, and you turn this silence over in your mind. Tonight, with a conviction both fleeting and deep, you'll understand everything you should do before you die. You'll write it down in some notes for yourself, so you won't forget it all when you sleep.

Later on at the window, the moon isn't out there anymore. Its orbital path took it down behind the building, and in the window of that same building, there's the woman with her lamp. Curtains veil her image in a yellow-white blur. She always looks angelic like that when she's folding her clothes. You watch her awhile, and then you're tired so you sleep.

Early the next morning the recycling truck wakes you up, with its high rolling hum and then the sharp scream of its brakes. You stumble out of bed, and see the notes that you wrote. You can read the writing, but you're not sure what it means. Its like a code to be deciphered by the person you want yourself to be.

Outside, bags full of bottles clash and break into the truck, falling with the full strength of their weight. You walk to the front window, and watch the recycling man. His pale blue suit matches his pale blue truck, which matches the washed out pale morning sky. In a graceful upward arc, he throws the last bag into the truck then jumps into the front seat and drives away.

You imagine what it would feel like to be nestled inside that truck in the seat next to the blue suited man. Everything you understood with such certainty last night is moving away from you again.

If only you could find a way to remember what you felt, with the moon and the woman and her lamp. You tear all your notes into tiny pieces, and throw them out the window to the street.