From guest writer, James Roland
I’ve been riding a motorcycle for five months, and I still treat it like a car. I can be cruising along a winding mountain road and find myself fumbling for a seat belt. I still reach instinctively for my radio dial, like a civil war soldier trying to scratch his phantom leg. And as if this isn’t disconcerting enough, I have developed a bad habit of zoning out on familiar routes, the worst of which found me ‘waking up’ in Encino at 1 a.m. when I should have been in north Sherman Oaks. After studying the lunar cycle and every 187 dispatch on the police scanner, I ruled out myself as possible werewolf. But the evidence still begged the question, how is it that a person can have such a hard time letting go of old habits, that they can zone out, even lose time, while cruising unprotected, 40mph, three feet above the asphalt?
That’s one for the ages. Or, for the 5 to 28 seconds you have to chat with another motorcyclist at a stop light.
See, there is another vestigial habit I have left over from the prehistoric days of car travel. Talking. And not just weather-chatting, no, I’m talking deep, on the fly, brain-rattling philosophy discussions that rise from the horizon like a summer squall and end with ruined friendships or deep sighs of intellectual contentment.
The trick is, even the ridiculous time restriction imposed on these thoughts in the time it takes for two people to drive to the airport or a friend’s party in Silverlake are nothing compared to the few precious moments two motorcycle riders have during a ride.
But after a little practice, you learn to concentrate your ideas into a kind of intellectual short hand, squeezing the works of great thinkers into bite sized portions. This may seem sacrilegious, unimportant, or pathetic. But to a select few, it’s our only chance to let our inner geeks seep out through our black leather and tinted helmets.
If this all seems too theoretical, just read the following transcripts.
Actually, transcripts might be a misnomer. Please read a fictionalized account of what I remember happening a few months ago.
I think.
Titus and I are cruising down San Fernando Road after another 2’oclock Critics session. We approach a stop light.
James (pulling to a stop and flipping up his visor): “So, I read an interesting interview of Alan Moore today.”
Titus: “Oh? That’s – ”
The light changes and we take off, whipping around a soft turn beneath an overpass, pulling up sharply to another intersection.
Titus: ” – pretty cool.”
James: “Yeah, it was about his latest work, a graphic novel called The Lost Girls. It’s his attempt to mix pornography and art.”
Green. We take off again, turning more directly north and feeling the desert wind start sucking the warmth out of the air. Another light.
Titus: “That’s not possible.”
James: “Mixing Porn and Art? Yeah, they both have different goals.”
Titus: “Yeah. And it’s just stupid and gross.”
James: “Agreed. What gets me is – ”
HONK.
Oops. We take off, this time for long stretches between rock hills. A few rolling stops, nothing useful to the conversation. Finally, a major intersection with tediously long waits between red and green.
James: ” – you can have art that’s erotic, and erotica that has artistic values, but to combine the core values of each is a contradiction.”
Titus: “Yeah. One is made to arouse emotion and thought, the other is made to arouse . . . .”
James: “Enough said.”
Titus: “Dude, how’s your bike?”
James: “Got the exhaust pipe changed, gotta do the oil tomorrow.”
Titus: “Cool.”
So there you have it. Try it out for yourself. I recommend some Plato or Ayn Rand. Maybe start up a motorcycle book club. And your maintenance manual doesn’t count.
