The Coldest Night Yet

Weather.com says it feels like 20 degrees Fahrenheit tonight. And I rode my bike home from work. I thought I was going to die of hypothermia and freeze onto the grates of a gutter before I was halfway to my destination. I cursed my prickly frozen thighs, my numb finger pads, my cartilaginous nose, my neighborhood far away. And then I saw a woman in a too-big poofy coat and an orange stocking cap, pushing a shopping cart full of torn garbage bags uphill in the middle of the street. And I am warm at home now with hot tea in my belly, and I have no idea where she is.