I feel a comradery with fellow Canadians, a certain patriotism, when I am pushing lumps of snow off the top of my car with my scraper, revealing the grey exterior: a mouse burrowed deep. We try our best to avoid getting snow on us. We open the door and it scatters on vinyl print. Side by side, with scrunchy faces and shoulders upheaved, as though our bones think if they rub together a fire might start.

I spent a little more time, with a little more care, brushing off my car today in the dark. Cigarette smoke out of mechanics plugged in to mechanics, grumbling until we shut them off.

They say it's not good for the environment to let your car run for too long (I say it's not good for the environment for cars to run at all).