Some conceive of time as shaped like a circle, while others conceive of it as shaped like a straight line or a spiral, when, in fact, time has no firm shape. We impose shape on it, the shape of what we do with it. I can undergo radiation or not, up to me. But first I must decide if life is worth the anguish of living. The doctors say that without radiation, there is a 30 percent chance of a recurrence. How I envy the coyote! Glimpsed for an instant in the flare of my headlights, it disappeared at a steady trot into the unbroken darkness at the side of the road.