I am sitting outside, on the front porch, with a glass of red wine on the table beside me, smoking a cigar. It is my last Cuban, from the stash I bought last year at the Indian smokes shop, up near Muskoka.

Not bad, eh? It’s almost summer. That pale mild light, the bare trees catching it.

The temperature outside, for the record, is twelve degrees.

Never mind. It works for me.