When I leave the house, snow begins to fall from an ashy and tormented sky. The wind comes up abruptly and rocks the car while it idles. I shortly move into white shrouds. A tattered man on a street corner shouts that comets are bearing down on us as punishment for our compulsive and rampant sins. I imagine a screaming streak across the sky and then the cataclysmic shudder.
Doom become familiar.
History, loved ones, everything lost. The man shakes his fist as he barks his warnings. Our eyes lock for a moment across mid-day traffic and then mine skitter away. In the rearview mirror, he becomes a puppet, herky-jerky on invisible strings. Some minutes later, I park the car and hurry through Philadelphia's Tasker Homes.