Transit Authority

The thing that sometimes escapes me about my bicycle commute is how deliberate it is. Sure, I can coast for a few feet, down a hill, but when that next hill comes it's back to pedaling. Each stroke is left and right, up and down. There is no radio to distract me, just the sounds of the morning and a neighborhood waking up.
This was the filter through which I watched the plume of smoke on the horizon. At first, I didn't even recognize it as anything but high clouds. The sun was coming up and I figured it was a chunk of weather that had skipped us, on its way to the Sierras. As I continued east, I noticed a distinct vertical-ness to the cloud. It was a column of thick, gray smoke. A block or two later, I could smell it.
That's when I started musing on the possible source: car fire, apartment building, somebody's house? It was the time of year when space heaters or holiday lights could be blamed for starting a blaze. I remembered another morning when I caught what was the end of a BART train derailment from a distance. It made a tall plume of potentially noxious fumes. I wondered if I was clever to be out in the streets, breathing in all that morning's poison.
In the distance I head sirens, no doubt heading toward the very same conflagration. I wondered how close I would be when I reached my final destination. Would it be my school on fire? But as I rode still further, I moved past the smoke and to the right. It was probably close to the hills. It made me wish, however briefly, for that regularly updated traffic report.
Of course I didn't need it. Nothing in front of me was on fire. I could deal with what was behind me on the way home.