After visiting my friend in the southern part of the Mission in SF, Google Maps directed me to the scariest bike ride I've ever taken.

In the dead of night, the trip began by passing under the highway on the highway. I learned, in my futile search for bike lane markings not there, that this road did not have room for me.¹ With the lights of the cars behind me, I felt the real fear of getting run over.

I passed a warehouse, and a warehouse, and a warehouse. Despite having grown up in well-forested Michigan, I passed for the first time a lumber yard. And then another warehouse.

Then I biked past the lot where all the buses park. It gave me the same feeling I got viewing footage of ghost malls - a creepiness, a wrongness of a normally active space now unmoving, unused.

After a wrong turn, I somehow ended up on an empty dock. I thought, well, if anyone would get robbed on a bike, it would happen here.

Finally, the hospital I recognized came into view. I never felt so relieved by such bright, sanitized corners. I exhaled a sigh of relief, and vowed to take an Uber next time.