I’ve always loved driving through thick fog. There’s something soothing about the way everything seems so quiet even as large trucks float past. Buildings, ordinarily rooted to their familiar spots, appear to have moved farther from the road or to have disappeared altogether until I get a bit closer and outlines emerge only to be swallowed up again as I continue along the highway.
This morning, sipping my coffee and listening to NPR talk about email encryption when it felt like they should have been discussing werewolves and witches, I drove through the all encompassing fog, unable to see the exit signs. I took the one that seemed right and drove alone into a silent realm. It was the correct road, but a different world where I found myself waiting at the last stoplight before school.
The light hangs above a lonely crossroads such as the one where Robert Johnson might have made his famous deal with the devil. I sat waiting for the light to change when a large shape appeared and grew out of the fog. The shape grew familiar, forming into a school bus that passed in slow motion. I watched the kids drift by, their faces blank. One little girl stuck her tongue out at me, and then they were gone, swallowed by the fog. I nearly choked on my coffee from laughing.
James Brush is a teacher and writer who lives in Austin, TX. He tries to get outside as much as possible.
I used to live in California’s San Joaquin Valley. The Tule fog there use to scare me with its impenetrability. Apparently it does not scare everyone though, they manage to get multi car pile ups everytime it happens