July storm came up fast out past Franklin yesterday evening, sky going green-black over the fields quicker than the radio said it would. I know better than to argue with Tennessee weather, so I pulled the Heritage under the awning of an old feed store that's been closed since before I had gray in my beard.
Sat there on the step watching the rain come down sideways, thunder rolling off the hills like a freight train with no schedule. Bike ticking beside me, both of us dry enough and in no hurry.
After a while an old boy in a pickup pulled in to wait it out same as me. We talked bikes and hay prices through his rolled-down window without ever learning each other's names. That's about the purest kind of conversation there is.
Rain quit like somebody turned a tap. Steam coming up off the blacktop the whole way home, and that smell alone was worth getting caught out.