As far as you, I or any other random guy who knows about the
safety as a biker is pretty much acquainted with the general principles of
motorcycle riding and precisely the attached safety to it and which is pretty much
every biker`s rant or a lullaby one recites giving one a mental picture or a
momentary freedom from the anxiety of one`s awareness of the inevitability of a
major fall while riding thus getting injured. Why am I so concerned, I ask,
while I write. Maybe because I give a
little too much damn about things and biking circles and people around me that
happen to bother me every now and then. Maybe the camaraderie I believe in is
less of a brotherhood and more of an old age group constantly reminding me of the
finite and the strict regime of under which one maybe called a biker or a
motorcycle enthusiast in today`s world. Anyhow the bottom line is that, this
all sucks, it stinks of the disgust these people have towards the raw and bare
fun of the exposed madness some people(riders) boast and loath too.
ATGATT (all the gear all the time) they`ll say.
Without a doubt every biker`s lullaby, on the tip of their
tongues thus vomited forth at the drop of a hat and balls perhaps. 1000rs Knee guards
(check), 1000rs elbow guards (check), 7-8000rs ECE approved helmet (check), 2500rs
gloves (check), 2000rs neck rest (check), 8000rs Jacket (check), 8000rs riding
pants (check), 10000rs riding boots (check), manly balls (ohh uncheck). Reminds
me of the last time one had a clear look down there, fondled his balls long enough
to mark their presence which apparently got lost as the old times passed and
new so called Bikers of today robbed the sheer fun and pleasure of motorcycle
riding and long gone are the ways of just what a raw, old school and an un-fashioned
motorcycle rider/enthusiast was looked upon as.
I bet it`s no long time now that these free floating bikers
will be spotted buying things down the vegetable store 2kms from their houses,
all geared up, colors matched to their bike`s paint looking no less than a fucking
power ranger amid the crowd.
My point is not how much gears are important. I think they are
equally important as my balls are, as my intact face is. I too prefer riding
geared up over long runs and short weekend stretches too but I keep a line
between my safety (gears while riding) and carrying a biker tag (all geared up,
every time.)
So i recall the motorcycle events from the old times that remind me of a simple
emotion of plain unadulterated joy of motorcycle riding, that they used to
carry. The un-doped pleasure of wind across your hair, dead bugs between your
teeth, brown dust on your eyelash, frost on your knuckles and the squish of wet
leather boots is long gone now, robbed by the pseudo-bikers of today.
Thus said in the early times (and can be interpreted in this manner i guess) by Ernest Hemmingway, a great
philosopher born in 1800s that “There are only three sports: bull fighting,
mountaineering and motorcycle racing, rest are mere games.”
What he saw then, are we seeing now?
