Motorcycle Views

Wild Motorcycle Tales

First Kick

Page 3

I twisted the throttle, pulled up the choke and with my left foot, leapt on the kicker. She coughed and blew two belches of blue smoke out the fishtail exhaust pipes. I let the kicker back up, gave two twists of the throttle and jumped down on the kicker and again she coughed, blew out two plumes of bluish smoke but refused to fire. Old Jack watched on in amusement, grinning at the fact that I was getting mad but was still trying and not trying to wimp out.

Once again, I gave her two blips of the throttle, jumped on the kicker, blood from my nose spraying up into my eyes and all over the shed as I descended on the firing arc. As my right foot hit the floor of the workshop, there was a loud bang closely followed by another and the old Harley burst into life, the noise of her nearly scared the crap out of me, she was actually rumbling to life.

The shed filled with that beautiful sound of a V-twin motor running that still excites me the same way every time I start any Harley. The roar from the pipes was deafening. It shook right through me filling me with a very strange feeling of pride, awe and power that left me feeling like my chest was going to explode and my head was going to be launched off my shoulders like a rocket from NASA to the moon. I have never felt that kind of high in my life before as I stood there with a now blood encrusted face and clothes, a bizarre looking being by all accounts.

Old Jack just looked at me with an even wider grin. He got off the stool and gestured for me to follow him and kill the motor. We went to the kitchen and he cleaned the blood off my face and explained why he had let me make a mess of myself.

"I could have told you how to do it beforehand but you would have made that mistake somewhere down the line and done it in front of people you did not want to do it in front of," he pulled on his cigarette and went on. "Now you will never, ever start a Harley wrong again, you understand?"

When he had finished, he uttered the best thing he had ever said to me: "Go out there and start her up and take her for test ride. Don't brake too heavily as she will slide out from underneath you, OK?"

The excitement returned instantly. "Holy shit, he is going to let me ride her," I thought.

I went out to the shed like a dog in heat or as Old Jack would say, "Faster than hot shit off a shovel."

I primed her, kicked her and carefully took her out onto the road. I felt alive. I felt free. I rode up around the village, back past the park, past the Garda (police) station, rattling their windows with aggressive throttle control, back up the new road and back into the driveway, all in all about five miles.

I sat in the garage telling Old Jack about my first spin, like I had just ridden in from Outer Mongolia or California to New York. I told him how the bike handled, leaving out no detail, especially the bit about the two cops running out of the station to see what was disturbing their afternoon nap. He laughed with me and told that today I had become a man, that there was nothing I could not do or accomplish and that I was now the master of my own destiny.

A strange look came over his face and a kind of sadness into his eyes, and I realized he was both happy for me and what I had just done but he was never going to be able to do that again. All of a sudden I jumped up, grabbed hold of him and hugged him. "Come on, we are going out," I said. He looked at me quizzically.

I fired up the old shovel, got on and handed him an open face helmet. His eyes suddenly became alive. He was trembling with anticipation. He struggled with his boney old hands to put the lid on and when I came over to help, he just shouted back some profanity that I could not hear over the bike and then with super human effort, the old man got on the bike behind me and off we went.

After 30 miles, we were back in the driveway. I set down the side stand, hopped off, got his walking stick and helped him off the bike.

We sat for hours in the workshop, him with his bottle of porter and his whiskey, me with my tea, listening to stories, some he had never told before because they were only for men and some that I had listened to before since I was a boy.

I always think of Old Jack and the way he stepped in to take on the father figure role and prevent me from becoming a lesser human being.

To this day, I carry with me the code of being both a man and a biker that he taught me. Every time I start a Harley and go for a ride, he is with me. Every time I find myself in a difficult situation or have to make an important decision, I ask: "What would you do Old Jack?" and in my head I hear his answer, some 26 years later.

I often wonder what he would make of the modern Harley. Indeed I can hear his answer sometimes as I push the starter button on my Night Train. He would probably look at me under his grey bushy eyebrows, grin widely and call me a lazy shit! I can honestly say that when Old Jack passed away a few years later, it was the first time I ever felt pain that penetrated all the way to my very being and blackened my soul a little, for the world was a darker place without him.

Old bikers have a lot they can pass on to us and they live on with us every time you fire up a motorcycle. So, the next time an old biker sits beside you at the bar or at the table at a bike event, give them a bit of time. You never know. You might learn something.

"What happened to the shovel?" I hear you ask. Well, my friends, that is a story for another day. -- Dyna

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