I adjust immediately to the present when it and the past disagree, I've rationalized to myself before. I see you with a new haircut or with 50 more or less pounds on you, and I'll immediately erase what came before to see you here and now. So there's nothing new to me about the penny in the bathroom floor. It moves a little at times, but it's always within a certain square foot of the door, I'd say. I've no idea how it came to be there now, but I accepted it immediately. At this point, I'd nearly miss it if it was picked up. As I said though, I'd immediately adjust. Wouldn't miss it a bit.

This is at the root of the coatrack famine. I forget the vision, seeing the cardboard boxes next to the door. The misplaced recliner. No need for a coatrack, just a vague longing. And when I get one, I'll smile about it for about two days, and that only due to this obsession. Then it'll be as if it was always there, there when I moved into the house. Just there, in some subsequent here and now.