Times like this, when she slips her hand into mine and holds on tight, and our husband becomes just a shadow in the doorway.

Everyone should remember being born. It doesn't seem fair that we only remember dying.

Rhine. The river that, somewhere out there, has broken free.

It's quiet for a while, and then Rowan says; "We could talk now. We're alone out here. No walls." "There are always walls." I say.

Do you know what my father used to say?" I ask her. "He used to say that songs had a heart. A crescendo that can make all your blood rush from your head to your toes.

I shake my head, watching snow tumble and swirl from an all-white sky. The world seems so clean if you only look up

I think, in this strange world of beautiful things, there may be some humanity after all.