I'd been staring down the barrel of this empty weekend. It was good to be busy, I reasoned, because when you were busy you were awash in the countless but comprehensible daily problems that crowd out pain and stifle remorse. That was healthy. That was a coping process. Or at least a delaying tactic. Useful but, alas, temporary. Because sooner or later the noise fades, the crowds disperse, and you go home to the burned-out lightbulb, the empty room, the unmade bed.