benja22

I don’t usually rise early on Sunday. Noonish is more like it. Then, not to ride a bike, but to hang around feeling groggy and guzzle coffee. I was up early yesterday morning because I was still up from the night before. My wife was out of town so I stayed up all night chatting online and doing some genealogy work on my computer.

Yesterday morning was a beautiful day for a bicycle ride. So I grabbed my Schwinn off the back porch at sunrise and started out on the road. It was still cool by ‘July in Kansas’ standards and the wind was nil.

I started out slow, coasting around town at sight-seeing speed while I smoked a cigarette and let my un-stretched legs warm up. By the time I had gone a mile across town I was feeling pretty good and decided to push it a little bit. I decided to tackle the big overpass that leads north out of town. Half way up? Well, I wasn’t feeling all that great about it anymore. I was weighing my options on wussing out or gritting my teeth when my brother George pulled up alongside me and began to tease me. I was now left with only one option.

The nice thing about reaching the top of a hill on a bicycle, if there is a god, is that now you can coast downhill and rest. Heading up the overpass hill going north is short and steep. On the other side you are treated to a long gentle slope. You don’t have to pedal at all for about a half a mile.

I turned onto the college road which is nice and flat, and cruised along nicely under the overpass and back into town. This section of the ride was so pleasant that I had forgotten about the strain of the uphill climb. Still feeling pretty good I decided to go to the end of Wells Fargo road. No one calls it Wells Fargo road around here. For old timers it is called cemetery road and for the younger ones it is called Pizza Hut road. It is a nice, lightly traveled road with fairly gentle hills. Each hill offers a fair coast on the other side. This goes on for about three miles till you get to another overpass and a fast quarter mile coast to the end of the pavement.

The temptation is to stop at the end of the road but it’s best to turn around and get back to the top of the overpass before stopping. So overlooking the interstate highway, I dismounted and grabbed a seat on the guardrail, drank my water and smoked a cigarette.

It’s nice to watch the cars go by and once you begin to head west down the hill it is an easy ride back into town. I climbed onto my trusty Schwinn and let gravity be my pedals till the flat land slowed me to the point I had to pedal to stay upright.

I pedaled to the river and enjoyed the calmness of the area as I coasted across the bridge. It was like a Norman Rockwell painting. I expected to see cartoon bunny rabbits and blue birds with ribbons in their beaks as Zamfir sat on the bank below playing his pan flute.

Enter Dog:

He came across the farm yard fast and with shoulders low to the ground and barking that “I’m a gonna get ya” bark. I stood on the pedals and tried to build up speed. I was losing the race.

He closed in on my right side and lined up for an ankle bite. Out of options again, I sat on the seat and kicked out at him with my foot. This served to slow him down but only for a moment. My right footed side kick caused me to swerve into the left lane. I saved myself from going off the road and laid into my pedals as the beast recovered and came with a new plan.

I was now pinned between the dog and the edge of the road. He came up on my front tire and moved sharply to cut me off. I grabbed both brake handles hard. The front tire stopped on a dime. The back tire did not. It rose like a bullet behind me. My handle bars began to roll over the front tire moving closer and closer to the ground. I decided this would be a good time to do my superman impression so I threw my hands out in front of me and flew.

It was a short flight. The landing wasn’t pretty but I nailed it.

I rolled painfully over my left hand into the ditch and laid there. The dog, having performed his duty admirably, strutted back home with head and tail high in the air.

I sat up cradling my injured arm and rocked back and forth as I muttered the F word over and over again on a Sunday morning.

After several minutes I picked up my water bottle, cigarettes, lighter, sunglasses and bicycle from the road and began limping the mile or so back into town. I soon had my legs and head working well enough to get on the bike. I rode slowly to the hospital emergency room.

Luckily nothing is broken. I have a stitch over my eye and my arm is in a splint and a sling. I have a fresh tetanus shot and a couple days off work.

So that’s the story of how my brother George almost killed me again. I’ll be back on my bike in a week or so and plan to travel the same road. I’ll be packing a brick.