Feeling more or less okay. I tried to run fast this morning. All I can say is I’m not twice as slow as half my life ago. Likely that makes little sense, but I’m too tired to figure it out. I need a nap.

Rather than sleep, I read, but then I’m too tired to focus, and it might be that I sleep for a few minutes. My wife is at the dentist for her semi-annual checkup. I think it would be good were she lying next to me. We could hold hands. That would be enough. But then I wonder if it would be enough for her.

I have this strange thought that were I to be graded as a husband, I might well earn an A- or more likely a B+, but not anything close to A+++, which makes me slightly sad. I let my specific shortcomings drift away, choosing instead to fantasize that she can be whisked back in time in order to meet that A+++ lover. I would be so happy for her. A true A man would no doubt resolve to overcome his shortcoming by any means, and throw dreams of time machines out the window.

I hear the car in the drive, and when my wife comes in I ask her how it went, and she says okay but she needs to pee and can I go to the car and bring in her purse?

Outside the sun feels good, though it’s still cold. Winter is yet a week away. I spot the dead weed in front of our basement window. During the summer it had small yellow flowers, and the latent poet in me mentally pens a snippet: Each petal a passionate kiss. I sling the purse over my shoulder, extract the cellphone from my pocket, and snap a picture.

Inside again, I ask my wife if she wants a snack. “Maybe later,” she says, busy reading the emails and texts she missed while in the dentist’s chair. I find the dead weed picture and send it to her along with a little poem about the petals.

When she gets to it she glances over at me, then rises from the couch, comes to me, takes my hand, and leads me to the bedroom.

Winter is a long way away.