These are the stages in our lives - the accumulation of things that make us happy and then their gradual release back into the world.

I won't need to dredge up the song's words for the occasion because I am living them. Among all of the anthems of our generation, this is the one, ironically, that has modestly come to pass - not 'Revolution,' not 'Born to Run,' not even 'We Shall Overcome.'

What I noticed was the silence that comes through the open windows only a few times a year, the quiet that descends when everybody else goes "to the lake." The steady, background hum of city life suddenly suspends itself like a switch has gone off, and those few of us left behind have the city to ourselves.