The other day, a dead rhododendron flower blew east down the street. When the wind switched the next day, it blew west. The dried-up flower of summer (clipped after the season for best results in the spring) looked an awful lot like a tumbleweed, the metaphorical symbol of a once-bustling place now deserted and lonely.

We are now fully entrenched in winter ’22 and any questions that this might be a mild La Niña year have been iced twice over by now.