Friday, April 6, 2018 10:30 PM

At night, almost asleep, I realize that I need to do one more thing. Walking toward the light switches, I hit an unexpected wall. I stop, look around, and try to get a feeling for where things are. My sense of direction has crashed. Colored lights glow dimly at several points (the blue of a phone charger, the orange of a power strip, the red of what I think is an emergency light), but their placement seems wrong. As my eyes adjust, I see that I am facing east rather than north. I walk, keeping one hand on the wall. The texture changes from stone to velvet when I touch the curtain at the entrance to the bomb shelter attached to my apartment. I turn, take a few more steps, and reach the switches. When the lights come on, I scan the room, wondering what else I might have forgotten in the dark.