Sunday Ride

Give or take a few, it was about twenty five years ago.  A good friend, named Lawrence, was taking his son to Boy Scout camp for a couple of weeks stay.  After talking it over we decided it would be a nice motorcycle ride, his son would love it, and with both of us involved we’d have enough room on the bikes for gear for a two week stay for the boy.  I mentioned our little daytrip to my son Carl, and he decided to ride along with us on his bike too.

The seventy mile ride to camp was uneventful other than it was a super beautiful sunshiny day, and we truly enjoyed our Sunday trip.  After settling in the boy, and making sure all was as nice as we could make it for him, the three of us began our return trip.  By now it was getting into late afternoon, but the weather remained beautiful and the ride was really great.  All went well for about the first forty miles or so, but the sky ahead was beginning to appear a bit ominous as it darkened too early for it to be evening already.

At the time I was leading the other two as we went through the small village of Dekalb, in St. Lawrence County, New York.  As we left the north end of the village, which is no more than a dozen homes, there was a sharp right hand bend.  The speed limit is yet only thirty miles per hour, but I probably was exceeding that, as I sometimes did in those days of yore.

As I rounded the bend leaving the village I abruptly twisted the throttle on the bike to increase my speed to at least the 55 mph rural road speed limit.  I didn’t notice the wet pavement until it was too late, but as sure as rain will always fall, it had that afternoon at that place.  As I hit the throttle, I also hit the wet road, and immediately I lost traction as my rear wheel spun.  As I was in the middle of the right hand bend, the rear of the bike went to the left.  I managed to get it back upright again, but only for a limited amount of time, before it went the opposite way in an over correction.  That time I knew I was going to lose it, so I stuck my left leg down in a foolish attempt to keep the bike tire side down. About that time the foot peg hit me in the back of my left ankle.  This caused my left foot to be driven into the pavement as the bike passed over my left foot.  The bike, and myself, went down in an ignominious heap as we slid across the wet pavement together.  This was not the way I had planned to exit Dekalb, but that was the way it was.

I was directly in front of a home from which a nice lady suddenly erupted.  She mentioned that she was a registered nurse, and did I need aid.  Not wanting to get the law involved in my foolishness, I insisted I was fine, but let me assure you my left foot hurt something awful.  The bike never quit running so I got it back up on two wheels again with the help of my riding partners.  I straddled that thing again, and reached down with my left foot to shift it from neutral to first gear.  Mama mia let me absolutely assure you that was the moment I decided I had broken the big toe on that foot.  The big toe is what is used to shift with.  Tears came to my eyes as I managed to catch the shift lever with the edge of the sole of my boot, and pull it into gear.  Twice more I accomplished this little trick, but to try to go into fourth and fifth gears was asking too much.  I rode the final thirty miles home in third gear managing somehow never having to stop or shift again.

I managed to hobble enough to continue working, but it was quite a while before it became possible to walk sort of normal again.  The toe ultimately healed, but it is sort of misshapen yet today.