Paul had finally reached an age where he could peg his mood to the seasons. It had been the majority of his 34 years of life that he'd cycle through the depression of winter; the rebirth of spring; the sheer force of pure energy in the summer; followed by the slow, cold dread that autumn brought on; all of which until just this year he'd weathered as if they were random loops through an unpredictable pattern of moodswing. It wasn't until this past September, when the light shifted overnight and a sharp chill penetrated the air that he realized that familiar feeling was coming back again. The dread, a sweet, sorrowful sadness, inexplicable and huge, that started to drift down over him like a blanket of thick fog.

Not once did the lace come out of the hole this time, no siree Bob. The hands were shaky, the knuckles more than a little arthritic, but Merle was still able to tie his shoes. Not that it wasn't a chore - it was. Everything was at 85. No one prepared him for the loss of sensation. Touch. Hearing. Taste. Sight. It all goes, quicker than you can hold on to the memory of it. They say that's how life'll go soon enough, just slippin' away like yesterday's turkey sandwich for lunch. Merle figures it can't be all that bad, 'specially if you forget that it's occurring just as it is. How 'bout that? Maybe it's the mind's way of foolin' itself out of the horror of slippin' away, Merle thought. Just forget.

Or maybe it already knows it's goin' to some place better?

Merle was already at the bus stop. See? That's how it worked. One moment he was tying his shoes, and the next he was already sitting on the bone-cold plastic seat at the bus stop with nary a flicker between. Where does the time go? He had to double check just to make sure he was fully dressed. It hadn't happened to him - yet! - but boy did it ever cross his mind that he'd have such a lapse, then find himself out at 4th and Main in his britches.