In Eau Claire there’s a bar called the Court’n House. It gets its name from the convenient escape hatch it offers from the county courthouse a block away. It’s a pretty typical Wisconsin bar: a revolving list of 20 beers on tap, a tiny fry kitchen that cranks out hamburgers and one of the best Friday fish fries in town, and a standing-room-only crowd that swells to raucous mob on Packer Sundays.
The last time I was there munching on a hamburger (two-for-one on Thursdays), I couldn’t help overhearing snatches of conversation going on between two young women a stool or two down the bar. One of them used the word “motorcycle,” so naturally my ears perked up, and I zeroed in, while feigning absorption in a plate of fries and glass of Leinenkugel’s: Industrial Style Coffee Table
“You’re kidding, you’re going to buy a motorcycle?”
“Yup, got the money, gonna buy it this winter. I’ve been watching a ton of videos, and I went to a cycle place last week.”
“Like a Harley? Gonna get a leather jacket and a doo-rag?”
“No, not like that, something smaller. I think I’ll ride it to work, and I want to ride in the woods, you know, on like, dirt trails. I mean, I’m not going to be jumping off hills and stuff, but maybe I’ll ride to California this summer when I’m on vacation.”
“Have you ever ridden one?”
“Well, no, but I found out there’s a state class you can take in the spring, it’s like a Saturday and Sunday, six or seven hours – they teach you everything.”
I’m no expert on motorcycling (I might qualify as “seasoned”), but though that course she mentioned might earn her a license, I’m pretty sure it couldn’t “teach you everything.” This newbie motorcyclist might be naïve, but I found her wide-eyed optimism and self-confidence warmly endearing. It took me back.
A few years later, a buddy down the street offered me his preposterously “customized” Honda S90 for 50 bucks and with little to no experience with the interplay between clutches, shifters, and throttles, I bucked and stalled it home on the sidewalk in first gear.
Actually, compared to my introduction to riding, her approach sounded positively levelheaded. My first experience with bikes was a ride on the back on my older sister’s boyfriend’s Triumph when I was 12. It was late one July evening, the air thick and soft in a blanket of humidity. I remember desperately clutching his sweaty white T-shirt (with the obligatory pack of Luckies rolled into one sleeve), as we ripped through town. But it had been enough. Back home, I watched my sister and her steady roar off, solemnly vowing to myself that I would have my own bike someday.
A few years later, a buddy down the street offered me his preposterously “customized” Honda S90 for 50 bucks and with little to no experience with the interplay between clutches, shifters, and throttles, I bucked and stalled it home on the sidewalk in first gear.
For some reason, my dad had agreed to advance me the cash, possibly thinking the ridiculous bike posed little chance of ever taking me further than the end of the driveway. And when I got it home, he took on his usual bemused smirk over his son’s pitiful excuse for intelligence. At that point, I suspect my parents felt their first three kids, spread over 12 years, had turned out pretty darned good, though they weren’t exactly sure how that had happened, and eager to explore life as empty-nesters, they had basically adopted a laissez faire policy when it came to rearing me. In fact, once I got my driver’s license and joined a traveling band, I was more like a boarder than a family member in our big, nearly empty house. Sometimes I would disappear for days, playing gigs from one side of the state to the other, or I’d be busy running the fire lanes just outside town. Upon return, my mom might say, “You still live here?”
My parents’ hands-off policy allowed me to wring out every bit of remaining life left in that poor Honda, and when I finally had had enough of bump starting and certain insensitive remarks from my buddies, I boarded a long, 20-year train of bikes. How do people get sucked into this weird, solitary and admittedly risky lifestyle? My pint glass empty and the bartender scribbling my bill, I leaned forward for a clue in the last few snatches of the bar stool conversation:
“But why do you want to ride a motorcycle?”
The young lady cocked her head and looked up at the soccer game playing on the screen above the bar, as if the answer might be there.
“I’m not sure, it’s just something I dream of doing. I just want to ride.”
More than words, her expression conveyed a familiar feeling. I couldn’t help wishing she would get to live her dream.
Two books about motorcycling by Ron Davis, Shiny Side Up and Rubber Side Down, are available at The Local Store, 205 N. Dewey St., and through most online booksellers.
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