A Story, Some Ramblings, Etc...

There are few times in your life when you will feel things as purely and as truly as when you have just fucked up. I don't mean little fuck-ups, like forgetting to pick your girlfriend up at work, or running the lawn mower over your child's favourite toy. I mean the BIG fuck-ups. The times when the only feeling you are capable of conveying to the world is a kind of slack jawed, gaping awe at the scope of your stupidity. You become completely incapable of focusing on absolutely anything else in your immediate environment. All that exists is you, possibly a few spectators, and the evil offspring of your recently absent mind, capering around like a deranged imp for all to see. At this point, you can't possibly defend yourself with any degree of credibility, assuming there were witnesses, so your only viable option is to try and prove to people, that although you fucked up, you know it already, thusly you are not a total moron, just an unfortunate soul, who forgot to turn left into the driveway, rather than into the fire hydrant.

"Oh man, I fucked up!" you say.

Now, to this, there are two responses that you are likely to receive. The first, and most preferable, is the compassionate lie.

"Oh, it's not so bad. You'll be fine, it'll look better in the morning. At least no one was hurt, (and here I am assuming that no one was hurt, if they were, this is probably the wrong reading material for you. Sorry, bud.)." Unfortunately, no matter how hard you want to grasp this concept, it is as elusive as the Loch Ness monster. You keep hearing that there is this creature, but you never manage to find any proof. There's just never any damn film in the camera. But you still want to believe. Just in case.

The second approach, and the most painful, in my humble opinion, is the flat-out, in-your-face, not-candy-coated truth.

"Yup. You certainly have fucked up!" Which is often followed by some horrible after-thought, along the lines of, "I wouldn't want to be in YOUR shoes right now."

Mr. Rogers, these people aren't, but they have to be commended for not blowing a lot of sunshine up your ass. No matter how badly your nether regions might need a tan.

So, here you are, nauseated with dread and remorse, possibly in physical pain, and you can focus on nothing but the dreaded 'What If' follow up. Closely related to the 'If Only" family. These, while as unavoidable as the proverbial death and taxes, must be minimized if sanity is to prevail. Allow me to present to you my own tale of Fuck-Ups, If-Onlys, and What-Ifs.

Picture, if you will, an excited, if slightly na�ve and much too enthusiastic young man, in his mid twenties, standing in a stranger's garage. He is looking at a motorcycle, a 1989 Honda CBR 600, to be exact. Something about which the young man in question has approximately zero knowledge, save that it goes fast and looks badass. This is the first bike this man, (we'll call him Bobby B., for no reason, except that was, and is, my name), has looked at, and it will be the only one. After a thorough inspection, consisting of oohing and aahing over the fancy paint with the REAL GOLD FLECKS in it, and making sure it had tires, Bobby B. strikes a deal to purchase said 1989 Honda CBR 600, and a further arrangement with the seller to have it ridden to Bobby B.'s place, since Bobby B. has no insurance or plates for the bike at this time. Or riding gear, for that matter. Done.

As the interested parties are heading off on their journey to Bobby B.'s place, the seller offers a helmet, to be included in the sale. "No thanks", says Bobby B., "I am going to buy a fancy yellow one to match the bike."

"It's free", says the seller, "I don't need it. You can keep it in case you want to take a passenger some day."

"Ok, fine." And Bobbby B. puts the helmet in the passenger seat of his car. He then climbs in and leads the way to his place, his newly purchased 1989 Honda CBR 600 following close behind.

Now, at this point in the story, if you're still with me, your probably thinking to yourself, "I see no problems so far." And you would be right. So far, so good. But it, unfortunately, doesn't stay that way for long. Trust me.

The ride to my place is relatively uneventful, save for the man riding the motorcycle missing a turn and having to pull a U-Turn to catch up with me. When we got to my place he informed me that I turned to suddenly, and that since it was April, there was a good chance there was still some salt and grit left on the road from the winter, and he didn't want to turn too hard and risk dumping the bike.

Aha. Sounds reasonable to me, but the man had just planted a seed in my mind. My conscious mind didn't recognize it, but boy did my subconscious have a field day.

So, the man hands me the keys, shakes my hand and we get in my car to drive him back home. We get to his place, and as he's getting out he asks if I was going to take the bike out for a quick spin.

"Nup", says I, "I have no insurance, or plates, or riding gear, other than that ugly ass one you gave me", I replied, somewhat reasonably I think.

"Ah, what could happen if you just take it up the street and back?"

DING DING DING DING!!!!!!!!! Warning bells should have been going off, but alas, I had my nuts stuffed in my ears, drowning out the sound of reason. Testosterone makes killer ear plugs.

As I drive off, I start thinking(always a bad idea, when combined with copious amounts of man-hormones).

"Yeah", I think, "What COULD possibly happen?"

Oh my friend, the answer to that is: PLENTY!! I get home, stick my head in the door, tell my sister I'm taking off around the block, and off I go. First thought I have is how the bike rides differently from all the other bikes I had ridden before(all two of them). It seemed a little less stable at low speed. I chalk it up to jitters. Up the road I go, about five blocks, and I turn around in a school parking lot. On the way back to my place, well, that's when things start to get ugly.

I stop at a stop sign, which gives me too much time to think. What do I think? I think, "I wonder what would happen if I cracked the throttle, just a little bit?" So, upon leaving this intersection, I crack the throttle a bit.

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, I BOUGHT A FUCKING ROCKET!!!!

I get through first and second gear in a HURRY! Scary stuff, so I decide that that was plenty enough for today, and I should back off. As I think this, I drive past a little girl on the side of the road. She waves at me, I wave back, all friendly like. Oh how I must have scarred that poor child. For not fifty feet down the road, I unleash hell upon myself.

There is this curve, you see. A slight curve. You hardly notice it in a car. But on a bike you need to lean to steer. Odd sensation. And I apparently am still going to goddamn fast, because I am not leaning over enough. Un-good. Remember that seed I mentioned? Well now is where it begins to bloom. I have this new and incredibly sharp fear of leaning my bike to hard, and dumping it. I am afraid to turn. Again...not good. Can you see where this is going yet?

Now that my fear of turning has shown itself, I realize that I am flat out not going to make the curve. No question. So I think, "Maybe if I just stop, everything will be fine. I might look like a bit of a tard, but you've experienced that before, and the pain fades."

Yuh huh. Nice plan. Except for one thing. I'm going to fast to make the curve, what makes me think I can STOP??

I squeeze the brakes. Not stopping fast enough. I need to stop NOW!! So I squeeze 'em harder. As a matter of fact, I probably just about squeezed that brake lever clean off the bike. Why do I think that? Well, because at that exact moment the front tire locked, and my bike disappeared from beneath me. Say it with me now...not good. No way this isn't going to hurt. My bike decides to hit the curb and show off a bit, doing cartwheels down the boulevard, while I try to outdo it, by barrel rolling down the road. As a side note here, if ever struck by the idea to try this, don't. It hurts. A lot.

I come to a rest on the front lawn of a nice lady who is very worried about me, and not yelling at me or anything. She is soon joined by a man screaming into his cellphone, "Some asshole doing 90 miles an hour down the street just crashed, you'd better send help!"

By bike incidentally, hit the curb, cartwheeled, as I mentioned, and shed almost every single piece of itself in the process. I was left with a frame and an engine. Every body panel smashed, the instruments smashed, the mirrors smashed, the seat flew off, I even managed to crack the engine casing, and leaked oil all over the nice lady's sidewalk.

So what seemed like about 15 seconds later, the cavalry arrives. THREE fire trucks, TWO ambulances, and THREE cop cars. Perfect. I am one lucky son-of-a-gun.

I'm going to try and compress the rest, as this is rapidly becoming epic. The ambulance attendants want to cart me off to the hospital, but as all I am suffering from is a bunch of road rash, and a few bruises, I decline. I felt I'd had quite enough drama for one day, I don't need to be strapped to a stretcher and carted off in an ambulance. Fairly quickly everyone realizes that the man on the phone might have been exagerrating a wee bit, and they might have over-shot on the count. Eight emergency vehicles was most certainly overkill. So eventually everyone leaves, except myself and the nice police officer who handed me some pretty yellow slips of paper. Summonses. Three of 'em.

You see, when you pull a neat stunt like this, you don't get tickets, you get automatic court dates. Lack of insurance, no plates, careless driving.

OUCH!!

I guess what I am trying to get across here, is DON'T DO THIS!

Ok, I am all written out right now, it's late and I need sleep. If you need more details, or a better ending to this story, let me know, send me a note or an email, and I might finish the story properly some day.

*BOW*