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“I shouldn’t have had to ruin this umbrella by using it in the rain. A frying pan or cookie sheet is never more perfect than when it hangs on a shelf in some kitchen notion shop. A new umbrella in its stand is the true idea of an umbrella, while the same object, flecked with sleet and turned half inside-out in a rough onslaught of November wind, that is the idea put forth, and the argument lost. As a team, weather and time win every debate they have ever staged, even against hearty teams such as steel, concrete, brick walls, and hope.” The shop girl looked at me as if I hadn’t spoken. “Do you want this wrapped as a gift,” she said. So I suppose we understood one another after all. We lived in the last days. We lived in the center of the wicked city. It was the first of November and the gale the weatherman promised had only just arrived.