The cracked window

This is the first of two short pieces I wrote during a really great evening while on the trip to the Art Factory in Kandern, Germany - written really quickly, and for the most part it was for the people in the room.  But I thought I'd share it here as well...

A cold wind rushed in at the crack in the window.  She had intended to fix it all summer and all fall, but had never gotten around to it somehow.  It had happened that spring, an accident – of sorts.  She’d wanted to throw it, a heavy object – heavy enough to smash a window.  She wasn’t mad at the object, but it had the necessary weight.  So frustrated.  She thought it would make her feel better, and she thought it had; and maybe it did, for a time.  But now, as the winter has come and the east wind whips past the pines on the hill, it hits hard her exposed east wall.  Where the window, designed to let in the suns morning beams, now gaping, allows the chill to seep through.  Morning after morning, she’s tried it all – warmer coffee, thicker socks, more layering, a ceramic warmer, a snuggly blanket, a hat, a coat, 3 different shades of masking tape, a piece of cardboard, foam, duct tape, a board and a disastrous attempt at caulk.  But what it needs, what it’s built for, is a whole window.  Until then, she cannot warm herself.  It takes a window, to hold out the wind and to let in the sun.  That is what a window is for.