Before World War II nobody had its own bedroom, nobody lived alone. Now there’s this sense of entitlement: your own bedroom, your own house, your own space.

We need space, we say.

This entitlement might not be a good thing, it might not work out properly, though you never know. The teacher calls it our Pandora-mind.

She’s gum, I chew. You don’t say of bubble gum that it’s the same every day. You chew. And chew. It sticks to the pavement. You start to notice.

I like the way she speaks. Words hang in the air before she drops them, she is silent for a moment, in that moment I can think.

Ownness.

The thickness of it, the density. She thinks words, then she speaks. She makes thought solid.

Own-ness.

Ownness.