A Walk with the Cold.

On my way out through the bitter cold, one of the security guards was leaving and offered me a ride to my bus stop or wherever I was headed. I thanked him and wished him well and told him that I enjoyed the walk like so many times before to all those kind souls who have offered to help a person in need; a walker in a world of drivers; standing out like a sore thumb against the fabric of our society I'm sure, especially in light of the relative inexpensiveness of gasoline these days.

Car tires sound different on the pavement at this temperature. They sound more solid, less malleable, less responsive. The cars careened past me, speeding under cover of night, hiding the shame of their disregard for safety and the law. I saw another set of tire tracks skidding to the curb and scathing the grass across the sidewalk and wondered how fast this particular car had been going when it swerved to miss a stopped car at the stop sign, it gave me pause and I wondered if I was tempting fate by my insistence on taking the bus. Tempting a fate that lie in wait to strike me in mid-gait. It can happen just as easily anywhere. The statistics show that most accidents happen in the kitchen or two miles from home in an automobile. What is it about that two miles? Do people who get in these accidents have a Pavlovian response to being closer to home and speed up? Or do they take for granted the lay of the land and familiarity becomes foe?

I arrived at my stop in the pitch black darkness of a winter sky passing the skeleton of a baby pigeon. It was a chilly and unpleasant wait and the ride home was somewhat less pleasant. There were only a few passengers at this late hour and the bus had little to weigh down its seams and the cold seemed to couple tightly with the high-pitched whine of the gears to the frame of the bus and it transformed into a front row seat in the deafening chamber of Hell's Orchestra.