From the first essay of volume: The Moment and Other Essays, a multi-layered portrait of a summer evening in the English countryside in the company of friends, we are delighted with Wolfes perception and her ability to articulate them clearly. A series of sensory descriptions the rumble of an airplane, the night darkness of an night, the flight of an owl give way to a thought no less important, even inconspicuous: If you are young, the future truly lies like a piece of glass, making it tremble and tremble. If you are old, the past lies on the present, like thick glass, causing it to oscillate, distorting it.