It may be over twenty years since we retired from the active work force, giving us the opportunity to use our time as we would, with spontaneity if we so desired, or to pursue routines that would give us great pleasure in our expanded leisure time. Retired we may be, but constantly busy with all manner of things, not least is pursuing various interests, and above all, having the luxury to read to our hearts' content. And make no mistake, it does content our hearts to be able to read whatever we want, devoting as much time as we can to that favoured pasttime.

Despite which, there are never enough hours in a day to complete all the tasks we set for ourselves, much less the left-over hours when our time is, as the saying goes 'our own'. One of the things about a working life is the travel it entails, from home to the worksite. Time wasted, but on the other hand an absolute necessity to get from here to there. Transit time is increasingly further and longer in our urban environments.

We would leave at an ungodly hour in early morning, rush to shower, have breakfast, clean up, dress for work and trot down the street to catch a bus to take us part way to our destination, transfer to a second bus and finally arrive at our workplace, then reverse the process in the evening. It was a routine that took between two to three hours away from each day.

Yesterday was an extremely cold day in the nation's capital. A light wind to exacerbate the frigid atmosphere. A fully blue sky, which is usual with such bitter cold. Although we bundled up well to keep warm, it was cold when we took ourselves out to the ravine. Jackie and Jillie needed their warmest winter jackets and their little rubber boots.

We're so satisfied with those boots; inexpensive but perfectly suited to the task, unlike the horribly expensive ones we'd bought previously, tailored for dogs, emulating humans' boots, and utterly useless; the colder the atmosphere the likelier they would fall off. Restoring them to their position covering those little legs and paws no pleasure at all in icy temperatures, all the more so since they'd just fall off again.

Thus armed against the cold we watched as Jackie and Jillie, excited as usual to be out in the forest, scampered off happily in all directions, wherever some scent took their attention. We could feel the icy wind lacerating our faces and despite my double mittens my hands began to feel the cold. In any event we weren't out as long as usual, taking a short circuit from the bridge at the depth of the ravine up to a long ridge through the forest that eventually dips again toward another bridge, and finally back up the long hill to the street. Seeing no one else out, unlike the day before.

At the very time we were out in the forest, close to when we began our return home, commuters on a west-bound bus from downtown Ottawa on a packed double-decker bus -- as the rush-hour began and traffic was picking up on major roadwasy -- were plunged into a disaster as the bus careened on ice, jumped a curb and smashed into the overhanging steel-and-glass roof of a bus shelter. The roof sheered off part of the top of the crowded bus's second storey. A person standing on the bus-stop platform and two seated on the bus were killed outright. Another 17 people were injured, some severely.

First responders were quickly on the scene, paramedics, firefighters and police. Area hospitals went into emergency reaction preparing to receive the wounded. Ambulances left, one after another, carrying the injured to various hospitals. The bus driver was taken into custody and questioned; she was released by morning. The city is in shock. The ordinary had become an extraordinary tragedy.

Three people were killed and nearly two dozen injured in a collision involving an OC Transpo double-decker bus at Westboro station Friday afternoon. (@karinawieser/Twitter)