Big Brown Bike

This recollection occurred to me a couple of days ago while I was toweling off the Yamaha. I had just finished giving my XS11 a bath and was drying her off, when from over my shoulder, the sun came out from behind the clouds for just a moment and from that particular angle, I observed the true color of the bike that most of the time, goes unnoticed. It’s a dark brown with fine metallic flakes that you can only really see when the light hits it just right. That moment made me recall a brief encounter that I had with a vulgar old man as I was standing in line at a convenience store while waiting my turn to buy a pack of gum.

Before I forgot about the experience, I draped the towel over the seat and went into the house to dig through my various notebooks to find a journal entry that I had made about a year ago. I knew that I wrote about the experience, as brief as it was, and when I found the entry, it was nothing more than a few quick lines that I had made regarding the moment and that was it. Apparently I didn’t think enough of it to go into any great detail or that I would even recall it a year later. From those lines and my feeble memory, I’ll try to describe the best that I can, the events that took place on an extremely hot day in the middle of summer last year.


“He was the kind of coarse old man that looked and smelled like he inhaled a pack of non-filtered cigarettes every morning for breakfast.” - Journal entry August 4, 2007


I was third in line behind two teenage boys dressed in Goth, and a female Construction worker wearing an orange high-vis vest, and a still visible ring around her sun bleached hair, evidence that she had obviously been wearing a hard hat all day in this oppressive heat. The last Bank clock that I saw when I pulled into the Gas station was somewhere in the triple digits. It was hot. I was standing there waiting my turn to buy a pack of Wrigley’s when from behind me I heard a gruff voice say, “One of the best G**damn bikes I ever owned.” When I turned around to see who had uttered this profane compliment, there stood an old man of probably about 70 years or so.

He was a somewhat shorter gentleman sporting a frost white crew cut, and what looked to be about 4 or 5 days growth on his face that wasn’t much shorter than the hair on his head. His fingers were deformed with arthritis and when he stroked the stubble on his face with his left hand; his index and middle fingers were stained nicotine yellow. It was obvious; this guy had a hard life. As he looked me up and down, I could tell by the expression on his face that there was something about my own appearance that he disapproved of. I gave him a half hearted grin and nodded politely and then turned back around and continued waiting in line. “XS11 Special” he continued, “Same color brown with the fine metallic flake in the paint, you could barely notice the flake unless the light hit it just right.” Obviously this guy new the bike, I glanced out the window at where the bike was sitting by the fuel pumps, with my back still turned to the old man, all I could think was, “My bike is brown?” Hard to believe, but I never really paid that much attention to it. I guess that it’s always looked black to me. Turning around slightly to acknowledge him, I replied, “I enjoy it.” He just stood there kind of looking more through my shoulder blades me than directly at me. I don’t think that he was necessarily speaking to me, rather he was just sort of reminiscing out loud. Now, as I’ve said in the past, I’m the son of a Truck Driver and I consider myself quite fluent in what my Father always referred to as “Speaking German”, but this guy had a mouth on him that could make a drunken sailor blush! Therefore I won’t go into any great detail about the vulgarity of his comments, lest I offend someone.

As the two Goth boys exited the store, I moved up one more spot in line, my helmet in one hand and the pack of gum in the other, all the while wondering if the gum was really worth the crude monologue that I was enduring. This guy was so extremely coarse and offensive, every other word was either a swear word or an insult, but what could I do, in his own Tourette-like way, he was complimenting my bike. Over the next 45 unsettling seconds or so that seemed like an hour, I learned that he had worked as a mechanic for a bike shop in Boise, Idaho back in the 70’s and that’s where he got a deal from a terrified owner on a slightly used XS11 Special. From what I could understand, the previous owner couldn’t quite get used to the shaft-jacking tendencies of the bike while accelerating hard out of corners. In my brief encounter, I could tell that the guy was a wealth of information regarding my bike, something that I have had a hard time obtaining, but I couldn’t stand much more of being seen in public having a conversation with the old man.

As the Construction worker made her purchase I learned the differences in tank sizes between the standard XS1100’s and the XS11 Special, why my exhaust pipes were wrong, and that my sissy bar backrest, in his opinion looked, well........Gay. Thanks for that old feller.

Completing my purchase, I found myself quickly making my way to the exit and gesturing my good bye with a polite nod of the head as I pushed the door open with my back. I’m sure that I was blushing. Out of the comfortable Air conditioned store and back into blast furnace like heat of the parking lot, I zipped up my jacket, drew out a fresh piece of gum and threw a leg over the bike. As I was putting my helmet on, I noticed the ill-mannered old bike mechanic slowly drive by in a rusting Dodge Diplomat with all of the windows rolled down and two hyper-active Yellow lab’s in the backseat, tails wagging and constantly changing places, switching back and forth from window to window. As he idled by, with a cigarette in his left hand and held slightly out the window, he gave the bike one last look before making a right turn into traffic, slowly disappearing into the rush hour congestion.

My Yamaha doesn’t exactly look like much by today’s standards and her 30 year old mechanicals are definitely due for a freshening up. Her pipes make more noise than I prefer, she drips a little oil here and there, and smells of raw gas whenever I forget to close the fuel petcocks at the end of a ride. There are those rare times however, every now and again, when I’m sitting at a stoplight in traffic, and I’ll get this odd feeling that we are being watched. I’ll look around and spy an older gentleman in the distance, either standing there on the sidewalk or in a car idling in traffic next to me, paying no particular attention to me, but gazing with a pensive look in his eyes at my old girl. They all look to be drawn back to a younger time; a time when Carter was President, Saturday Night live was hilarious, and Disco was just leaving, somebody get the door will ya.

I am reminded at moments like those of how our machines are all time machines of sorts; to different people and for different reasons. My Yamaha was quite a bike in her day and there are still older guys out there who remember that, even if some of them are boorish, rude and utterly offensive.

Next time that you’re out with your current ride, take a few extra moments to look at your machine a little more closely and just study its details and think about it the way you do pretty much all of the time and hold firmly to those thoughts so that you remember them well. I have a feeling that 30 years from now, we are going to be that man or woman standing on the sidewalk gazing pensively at a kid on an old bike sitting at a stoplight in traffic. After all, that isn’t just any bike that they’re riding, that was once our bike. And for heavens sakes, if you’re going to say anything at all to the poor kid, be polite, eh?

Now if you’ll excuse me, before it gets too awful dark and I lose anymore of that sunlight, I think that I’m going to go suit up and take my Yamaha out for a ride, you know the one that I’m referring to, it’s the brown one with the fine metallic flakes in her paint that you only notice when the sunlight hits it just right.

Ride Well

E.T.

This post is one that I brought over from "Keep the Rubber Side Down."

Questioned
June 4th, 2008 by rick

Favorite brand of bike? Doesn't really matter although there are quite a few that I could never imagine owning personally.
Favorite color of bike? For most, I have no real preference, but I do prefer my Ducati's to be red if it's not a problem.
Do you always wear a helmet? Religiously, ATGATT.
Most miles ridden in a day? Somewhere around the 1200 mile mark. I've never really logged the exact mileage or time to the hour. Quite a few 24 hour marathon rides though.
Do you belong to a riding club? Nah, I'm one of those lone wolf types.
How many bikes do you personally own? Two, KLR650 and an XS11. There is probably a boxer somewhere in the near future.
Do you wave at passing bikers? I try to, but like Rick says, I hate getting dissed.
How many brand t-shirts do you own? No t-shirts, I'm more of a hat guy myself. Currently, I have a Ducati Corse, a BMW, and a classic logo Triumph lid.
Do people think you are obsessed with motorcycles? Pretty sure of that.
What is your favorite type of riding? Solo, long distance stuff. The more time spent on the bike, the better.
Do you have any riding superstitions? No, but my motorcycle riding form has always been very similar in posture and foot placement on the pegs to riding English on horses. I don't post on a motorcycle like I would on a horse. That would just confirm my insanity.

Rainy Sunday Morning

I awoke this morning to a steady gentle rain. It must’ve been raining all night because when I let Flicka (my German Shepherd) out this morning, the ground was so soaked, that the water percolated up between her toes. She quickly did her business and had enough of that, trotting back into the house with her head down and ears laid back, carrying an annoyed look on her face.

I had taken Monday off this week so that I could score another three day weekend with the intentions of taking some day trips on the bike, the steady cadence of the rain falling on the skylight in my kitchen suggested that perhaps I should make other plans.

Walking out to the KLR, I pulled Don Quixote out of the saddle bag (The book that is, the saddle bags on the KLR are nowhere near large enough to stow a 17th century Spaniard) and took it back inside to read until the morning rain subsided. While lounging on the Sofa in the living room, the window slightly cracked so that I could take in the therapeutic effects that a softly falling rain has on me, I started thinking about Quixote’s horse, Rocinante.

Jeff Buchanan, in his essay in the April issue of Cycle World, christened his R1200GS “Rocinante” in honor of Quixote’s steed, and that is when the thought struck me, “Why not?” The translation of the book that I am reading is done by Tobias Smollet, and throughout the novel, he does a great job of marking footnotes on various translations and interpretations for simple minded types like myself. One such interpretation comes when Cervantes introduces to the reader, Don Quixote’s horse.

Cervantes describes that the animal was as gaunt as Gonela’s (Gonela was a well-known jester in the court of the Dukes of Ferrara.) and that he was tantum pellis et ossa fuit (A Latin phrase that translates as “Skin and Bones”). Quixote of course, saw him in an entirely different light.

Four days had passed that Quixote consumed in inventing a name for his remarkable steed. Four days of choosing, rejecting, amending and torturing himself with a revolving world of names, in his imagination, he fixed upon “Rocinante.” In Tobias Smollet’s translation, Rocinante combines two words, rocin (work horse) and antes (before), suggesting that Rocinante is past his prime but, as Smollet notes, once “ranked before all other horses.”

Once upon a time, on the opposite coast......

Some twenty years ago or so, where I was living and riding my sport bike all over the Eastern coast of the United States; I read an article in Motorcyclist magazine on a comparison of the various Dual Sports that were out at that time. If my memory serves me, it’s the same article that had a picture of the brand new ST1100 on it. Nick Ienatsch and Lance Holst did a comparison between the new Honda and the Kawasaki Councours, riding 1200 miles in 24 hours from L.A. to the Grand Canyon and back. I still have this issue somewhere in a box, I’ll have to dig it out and see if my memory is correct. Somewhere in the back of that issue was the comparison of the Dual-Sports. Let’s see ummm.... a Yamaha XT650, the Suzuki DR650S and DR350 and the two Kawasaki’s, the KLR650 and the Tengai.

Keeping a long story short, the KLR650 came out on top in that competition, squeaking out a victory over the Suzuki on the merits of it’s electric starter and that “Ship of the Desert” fuel tank. The KLR was my favorite too. For somebody with my inclination for riding ludicrous distances on a bike, that 6 gallon fuel tank was the perfect ticket. The fact that I was only 19 years old and couldn’t possibly afford another bike, I put that KLR on my wish list, promising myself that someday, when the time was right, I would buy one. Who would’ve thought the bike that I was so taken with due to its simplicity and willingness to please on such a basic level, would have such a model run. Almost twenty years later, I kept my promise to myself and bought one. Okay sure, Kawasaki made improvements to the wind protection, electronics, and brakes that KLR owners have been wishing for through the years, but all in all, at it’s heart, it’s still the same basic motorcycle that it was two decades ago. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Needless to say, after twenty years of waiting and promising and now, finally purchasing, I can honestly say that I am very pleased. There is not an ounce of buyer’s remorse with this machine. A promise kept, feels good.

Back to the present

I feel there is something special amongst us Motorcyclists, looking out there at the broad kaleidoscope of bikes; it seems that there is a machine for each of us. We are all different individuals with our own values and personalities. We all ride very different machines suitable to our tastes and lifestyles, and yet, at the core, somewhere deep down, my own personal observation over my lifetime is that whether others choose to agree with me or not, we do share a common thread. A certain quickening of the heart that our bikes provide as we approach them from across the parking lot, anticipating the imminent ride. This is in fact one of a multitude of reasons why I’ve waved to all my fellow bikers (scooters too) through the years, waving even to those bikers that I am quite certain will not return the gesture, we all share that same quickening of the heart. Buried deep down, somewhere at the foundation of our countless diversities, we share something in common. But I’m wandering off here.

We Motorcyclists, as diverse a group as we are, look upon our machines (most of the time at least) as a thing of beauty, even when others can’t possibly see it. There are many bikes out there, but none quite as perfect as the one we personally ride.

Rocinante

“An appellation, in his opinion, lofty, sonorous and expressive, not only of his former, but likewise of his present situation, which entitled him to the preference over all other horses under the sun.”

Miguel De Cervantes

My own Rocinante

There once was a time when my humble KLR was at the head of the pack, a time when she “ranked before all other horses.” She is my Rocinante.

A few hours have passed since I put down the book and began typing this and the rain, it hasn’t stopped. I glance at the screen, look out the window at the falling sheets, and then back at the screen. I think about the weather, and then Jeff Buchanan’s article, Quixote and Rocinante..........

To hell with it, I’m going for a ride.