On keeping a window open

I sleep with the window open through most of the year, including the months when this is clearly a bad idea. It is not about temperature. It is about the sound of a street that is still going on without me — a car every few minutes, someone's door, the particular hush around four in the morning when even the city gives up for an hour.

A closed room is a room that has decided something. An open window keeps the question open.

My grandmother did the same thing and gave a much more practical reason: the house needs to breathe. I suspect she also just liked the noise.