THE ROAD 2019
We went for twelve days; a long ride. Some’ like 5000 miles. Down into the United States and back. We rode hard. So hard that there was nothing to comprehend; just live. Just be. Wind whipped, throttle happy. Only now do I begin to relay it. And relay it I do. Welcome.
Day 1 of 12
To leave the city, before 6 AM. To first light, coming. Some, some call it the dawning and that works well. We ride through landscapes, endless. We rode for 13 hours, and 500 miles.
Day 2 of 12
We woke in some damp green patch in a semi-arid desert in Washington. Artificial in grandeur, we woke to sprinklers drowning our tent. We ride through a strange blue-collar town, stop to drink cheap Mexican coffee from styrofoam cups. People look at the bikes. A large man opens a sliding window of some All-American diner, asks where we are from. We continue on. Up a hill and into Oregon. The plateaus and plains do come again. We ride through dips and swoops and long straight stretches. Sometimes I lose sight of him over a bend, only to find him again, and lose him over the next. “Eyes on the Prize,” And I always find him again.
Day 3 of 12
Day three we make it to Idaho. The backs of cars say “Famous Potatoes”; that’s the license plate slogan in Idaho. Around noon we stop for coffee. It is from the faded porch of a general store that we meet Cat + Duck. They too are on the road. They ride vintage Harleys. Duck rides a 1968 Electra-Glide; he has put over 400,000 miles on it. Cat rides a 1975 Super-Glide, she has put over 250,000 miles on it. Duck says: We ride until they break. When they break I fix them. Then we ride until they break.
Day 4 of 12
We woke in the Motel 6 in the dark and lifted the curtain to see our bikes parked there in the dark and we rose from the one bed shared, and we packed our bikes and rode east to the Chevron where we lubed our chains with the green gooey spider silk and where we shared a large gasstation coffee at some hour around 0600. Then we rode towards Nevada in the rising light. The desert was cold; the morning brought about smells of pepper fields, mint fields. At some point in space and time we were in Nevada, though exactly which point I cannot remember, but I do remember pink-blue sky, open highway, sparse in traffic, like rushhour doesn’t exist on the Interstate; maybe that’s it.
Day 5 of 12
In the night in Vegas we each woke numerous times lifting our heads to see our bikes. each time they were parked where we had left them, underneath the bright light awning of CIRCUS CIRCUS parked crossbone style, headlight to exhaust.
In the morning maybe at 0500 we rose to the dark and splashed the stale water on our faces in that dingy bathroom and we packed our bags in the dank air conditioned room. outside the air was thick and heavy and a hot wind blew, even at dawn.
we rode down the strip at golden hour. more quiet than the night before, of course, but still with people; runners, running. hotel staff, bussing. bus drivers, going home. wherever home might be in that city, I’m not sure.