Rose sun tea, Mahler's 5th, transcontinental lovers reunited, a good book, a wide-brimmed hat, and chicken stock simmering on the stove. In the evenings Brugmansia tempt the moths, in the day the naked ladies glisten pinkly and arc on their bare stems. What is more romantic than this August?

This year the first lover I ever took married a woman named Rose. He told me with an embarrassed smile and a confessional tone; he had divulged the information to a friend of mine before entrusting it to me. I remember Paris and the first month we lived together in a small apartment off of rue Raymond Losserand on Passage des Arts. I remember the singing of the Portugese neighbor below and the smell of fish and chicken cooking in his restaurant. Our fights, the view from that window where I would sit on the too-thin frame, the cactus and herb garden on the sill in the kitchen-- How much time has passed since then, and how much I've learned about love!