the bitter cold of the night

follow the son down the stairs, along the hall and out into the cold icy alley. The sky is clear, but it is early in the morning yet and the cold of the night has made every surface icy. Follow him, he is wearing his fern green jacket with the orange hood, he has wrapped his arms around himself. He is still eager to go to the café, this is important to him.

Cross the market street just at the freshly-cleaned monument to the fallen of the two big wars in the last century, the last wars that took place here. It is a strange thing, with helmeted figures growing out of some kind of a stump, like a tree. It is not abstract, it is strange.

The bakery is just there at the corner, a tiny corner with a table, it functions as a cafe. But first stand at the counter, exchange greetings with the proprietor, she is waiting patiently. The son places his order, he takes a coke. Order a coffee and a croissant. It is not like the croissant's in France, but that is what you get running under that name here. Move over to the second half of the cäfe, the coffee is being made freshly in the machine. A noisy process, the machine grumbles and groans.

Take the seat at the window, look out at the fruitier on the other side of the road, sorting his vegetables, emptying a bucket of water into the gutter. The window sill in the cafe has a notice on it asking to please not deposit objects upon the window sill. There is a careful decoration of pots and things there.

When the coffee is finished go around the corner to where the little black car, bought last Saturday, is parked. The insurance company has demanded to know the reading on the milometer, it wants to know how many kilometres a year that the car is driven. The car's windows are opaque with ice, but this does not matter, all that needs doing is for a picture of the milometer on the dashboard to be made using the small camera in the phone. That is enough. It saves paper.

Leave the car to it's frozen solitude at the side of the road.

Walk through the frozen town, and discover that the clothes put on in the morning in the face of the clear sky are insufficient to keep out the discomfort of the bitter cold of the night.