As I ran this morning by the park I noticed a familiar object on the sidewalk, nearly lost in the pebbled concrete: a Scrabble C. About twenty feet later, there was a D. Then a K. A Q. Two upside-down tiles now. (Or were they blanks?) Then nothing.

I considered the likelihood of seeing another letter. As there had been a few, wasn’t it likely there’d be more? I scanned the pavement beneath my lumbering feet. Nothing.

Suddenly, there they were in one big, vomity splatter. All the letters, B and X and E and everything. I swerved around them. A few steps further, I saw a single letter tray, resting upside down.