Two Types of Motorcycle Riders

The day was a bit of a disappointment. A beautiful, sunny day in May when I expected to ride my 1100 Yamaha the hour to work in 70 degree weather, turned out to be quite a bit colder; 60 degrees, which isn’t horrible but would make for a longer ride on a day where I would rather have been cuddled in the warm blankets. After some discussion I ended up borrowing a bright yellow coat because my un-insulated jean jacket just wasn’t going to be enough. I was also talked into tying a rag onto my wet head and following up with a helmet instead of putting on a beanie that was lacking in more ways than one.

On the road I went, the cool air waking me up but with all the fuss I would have to get a real move on if I wanted to arrive at work on time. My fingers were ice cold as my body bucked the bitter north air. I cracked open the face mask to remove the fog (wet hair, remember) so I could see.

The trip was to last a total of 64 miles, just to pull into town with an additional five more miles to arrive at work. Most of the trip moved by unnoticed but I knew it was getting late and I worried that I would be late for work. I had been late quite a bit lately, and quite frankly I did not want to hear about it. As a result I kept my speed up hoping the small town sheriffs were still at the coffee shop.

About half way, construction showed up. Ah- man, I forgot about the construction. Stress surged through my body as a pit showed up in my stomach, and my arms began to itch from the incoming hives I was developing. I wonder if I could just call in sick? I knew it was too late for that…I just had no other reasons that I could use regarding my tardiness for a meeting with my supervisor. If my meeting would have been with anyone else I wouldn’t have fretted, but I did not want to keep him waiting…again.

The traffic was moved from a 4 lane interstate, to a 2 lane, with my group being transferred to the other side, which was easy enough. As I approached, though, I realized that I would be riding directly behind a semi. No thanks, not today. I sped up and passed him just in time to follow the lane over the median onto the opposite side. So here I traveled, about 3 miles under the speed limit, which was already at 55 instead of the regular 75. My heart felt like it had a bubble in it causing increasing pressure; at any time it would be too much for the valves, blasting the arteries away from the organ spewing blood all over and therefore ending my misery. No such luck. The dumb little S-10 pickup in front of me drove steadily forward, only able to go as fast as the person ahead drove and so on and so forth. My mind began to wander to other areas, but it was brought back to the present situation when the sign, the wonderful, wonderful, sign with a huge halo and heavenly music playing as it glowed, read: End of Construction 1 mile.

I began to rejoice and to plan. I glanced to my right at the “old” part of the interstate and realized that there was a single lane coming from the overpass that we had just encountered and that would merge with my current lane when we returned to the other side. Seeing the temporary road that would bring us over the median, I began to speed up to make the move seamless. I recalled a short memory of a driver’s education lesson, then snapped back into reality when I realized that the pickup did not speed up as much as I had, so I began to slow down to elongate the distance between us, only, it was getting shorter. Hm, I recall thinking, I pressed on the brakes more, but the distance again, was getting really short, really fast. I thought about going to the right, through the ditch onto the other side but was unsure if there was a vehicle driving in that merging lane or not; unfortunately I did not have enough time to check.

I then had to make the decision of whether I wanted to be hit from the side by a vehicle going at least 60mph or if I wanted to work with what I had in my control. Recall that we are on a temporary road, a one laner with no shoulders and big concrete blocks to prevent swerving into oncoming traffic. I had to give it one last ditch effort, so I practically stood on my foot brake and squeezed my right hand as hard as I could. The front forks hunkered down as I waited to stop, although by this time the Chevy S-10’s brake lights had come on and he was stopping even shorter.

I kept the bike nice and straight, thinking, I don’t want to go down, I don’t want to go down! The tailgate, I swear, kissed my nose and sent me a “Welcome!” fruit basket. I watched as the grey tailgate paint became several dimensions of color, big flakes of a medium grey glitter, and really small flakes of a bright grey speckle on top of a medium based, flat grey all covered smoothly with a clear coat; I saw, yes, I saw my face planted into that tailgate and that was not my chosen result, so I shifted my weight to the right just slightly in order to lay down. I had flashes of imagination that showed sparks flying high and bright as my bike and I slid at high speed right under the truck, as I had become a secret agent on an undercover mission. I felt my right shoulder land flatly on the cement and my head briefly bounce off the ground and out of my imagined movie. I was grateful to the sound of the sharp gravel stop my helmet from landing in China.

All I could think about was the semi traveling behind me that must be damn near on top of me by now. I stood up to head toward the ditch, but my leg- oh my leg there was something wrong, it wasn’t moving like it should. It felt heavy and was not turning like I wanted it to, but I kept moving and the weight was removed as I realized that the bike had been laying on it. Who knew? I turned around to this imaginary semi with the really big chrome teeth smile at me as I watched it crush the only thing I had wanted for years and years; reality though, showed me a guy in a bright yellow vest standing in the middle of the road with his hands up and a nondescript semi just rolling up to him.

Suddenly I could not breathe so I whipped my helmet off to gulp some air and saw my ride laying on its side blocking the only lane for traffic. As I bent over to pick it up, my head swam to the point of falling over. Another man came to help before I toppled over on top of it. Humiliation ensued, with the brake being stuck which prevented the ability to walk it anywhere. After dragging it over to the ditch, the men gave me a ride to the nearest town. I thought later about how lucky I had been that those two had been there; there were no other workers on the road. None at all, anywhere.

As my local bike shop allowed me to borrow their trailer to pick the bike up, Bob, the owner said to me, “Don’t feel bad. There are two types of riders; those who have gone down, and those who will .”