Transitions

I passed a neighbour yesterday, an old woman with white hair, wearing a loose shift covered in flowers, starting to bend over and shuffle. “It was cooler today” she remarked. If it was, I hadn’t noticed. I’m still changing my shirts three times a day, and you probably don’t want to hear about the various skin problems I’m experiencing thanks to all this heat and humidity. But there are other signs of summer coming to an end: other neighbours packing shopping bags with bits and pieces of their belongings, stuffing them into cars for the short but traffic-clogged drive back up the hill to their winter homes in Mosta or Birkirkara or Balzan. The group of young people in the next-door flat, acrobatic performers from Bulgaria and the USA working here for the season have left. They’ve been a lively and friendly presence during the summer. I went out to my local mini-supermarket at 6 in the evening – unthinkable due to the hot sun just a week ago. I feel like I have evenings back again, though just for a short time, before they disappear into the night of winter.