I opened my windows yesterday and let the fresh air in. They’d been shut for a good while. At least ten years. Somewhere in the throes of my wife’s dementia, she took down the screens, and the windows stayed shut. I didn’t think much of it at the time. Although it seemed odd, the house in most cases was her purview. She’s been gone six years now, however, and yesterday, on a nice fall day, I thought, I’d like to open a window.
They were hard to move from inside the house, impossible in fact, but gave way easily from the outside. A little pry bar got them moving. I cleaned out the sill tracks caked with debris, wiped out the spiderwebs, and put back the screens. Then came the breeze. It was nice to see the curtains moving once again in the wind, in the same way they did, each spring and fall, when my wife was well and alive. And it was nice to see the curtains moving once again as the house breathed in and let out the stale air of her passing.
