When I crumpled falling off my Harley, the raucous amusement of motorcycle brothers didn’t cut deep – it was worse.
It was filled with pity. After fifty years of riding, I had become what I most wanted to avoid becoming: a burden. Not a leader. Not even an equal. Not much more than just a man whose best days were over, and was only tolerated because of obligation, not respect.
The pain of their laughter went deeper than the scratches on my palms.
“Be careful Ghost” Razor said as he strided over to easily lift my bike. My new president Razor was big, bright, and barely into his thirties, half my age and twice my stamina.
Two more guys got me on my feet. Perhaps it’s high time to think of something lighter? Or rather something with three wheels?” he added, smirking.
I mumbled something non committal, fighting to save my pride. But on the inside I was bleeding a lot more than when the buckshot got me in ’86.
My knees throbbed: the correct one rebuilt from ’79 wreck, the worn out one from years of overcorrecting.
Later on that night, I felt the squares of my vest and on each one was experience and not a gift. Each stitch recorded miles cycled, wounds mended and brothers buried. These kids? They hadn’t deserved half the privilege of those patches.
Next morning I was packing my gear and there he came – this time coming with a couple of younger members.
“We had a meeting,” he said without looking him in the eye. We believe this is the time you should put away the patch.
I looked into their faces; with sympathies, with indifferences, and just awkward. A small number I had personally taken into the club refused to even look me in the eye.
I had three choices: struggle for staying, slide in quietly, or make them remember who I was.
Here is what I did: I called a man I hadn’t talked to in almost two decades — Tommy Banks.
He was my riding buddy in the ’70s and he left the road to practice trauma surgery. I told him how I’d become a joke to the only family I’d ever known.
It was quiet on the line. Then he told them: “Come see me”.
Two days later I drove up to his house in the Black Hills. In his garage he had a personal medical facility more advanced than most hospitals. Typical Tommy—always unconventional, always brilliant.
While he was working on my knees we talked about his career, my years on the road, the brothers we’d lost, and how different the club seemed now. He listened. Then he smiled.
“There’s a ride tomorrow,”
He said. “The Medicine Wheel Run. Five hundred miles in the Black Hills. No breaks except for gas. It’s more or less a Sturgis legend now.”
And you think I should do it?
These treatments will not make you young again, but they will lessen the pain,” he said. What’s left is the stubborn bastard I used to ride with’s.
I rolled up to the start line the following morning. There were 500 riders there, mostly young, mostly full of bravado. There was Razor and a few of the club members, who were astonished to see me.
The initial hundred miles were good. The second hundred took focus. By mile three hundred bikes were melting and tappers were getting up. My body hurt, but what wasn’t the worst part about it? It was the test of will.
I passed Razor at mile 400. The side of the road boasted his bike, engine steaming. I nodded as I went by.
When I was able to roll into the finish line, I was barely standing on my feet. My legs shook. My spine screamed. But I had done it.
Later on the same night, when the sun went behind the hills, Razor came across me in the campsite.
“We had another club meeting” he said. “We voted. Unanimously. Your patch stays. For life.”
I stared into the fire. “Why the change of heart?”
“Because today, you reminded us, what this is really about,” he said. “Not speed. Not age. Heart. Brotherhood. Earning your place.”
The following morning five hundred bikers met for the legacy ride. Up front: my one old man on a Heritage Softail, his jacket faded in time, but carrying half a century of road stories.
They could’ve passed me. They didn’t.
And me? I still ride. Slowing down now, not so far. My knees hurt when it’s cold and I rest more. But each time that I throw my leg over the seat it is for every brother I have lost. For the road that made me. And for a fraternity that is still alive, as long as we know what it is for.
