at the cost of mobility.

Northwest Indiana, January 2009...

Your apartment’s walls are transparent You look through them, as if through windows, at the January outside Three hundred and sixty degrees of surrounding neighborhoods, populated by transparent homes with transparent walls, with interiors visible from your second-floor apartment, with its useless electric heaters mounted on the walls You look down on dinners cooked with lovers, on discussions about what to put at the top of Netflix queues, on plans to visit the lake-shore dunes (you hear they’re lovely covered in snow) You look into homes where winter makes no difference, where human bodies keep other human bodies warm, where the warmth of conversation, shared projects, and mutual involvement make the low-lying sun a puny superfluity.

You wrap yourself in a fleece blanket, layered atop your long johns and flannel shirt, worn like a woman wears a towel, tucked under your armpits, covering you from chest to ankle, wrapped tightly, a makeshift, but functional, strapless dress Warmth via tight dress, like sexiness via tight dress, comes at the cost of mobility, which means that you unwrap and leave your spot primarily to take shits and showers, but the latter isn’t so much of a worry, as it’s too cold for sweat, and there’s no one around to impress You turn off the lights so no one can see inside It’s okay if you peek into others’ homes, but your place is off limits.

You thought your lethargy was the result of some defect of yours (depression, laziness, insufficient vitamin-D) But recent voyeurism simply reveals that others would be the same if they didn’t have others to prop them up, to circulate energy from body to body, to keep their bodies moving You only have your strapless dress, which keeps you warm at the cost of mobility.