BACKROADS • OCTOBER 2021
Page 4
FR E E W H E EL I N’ BRIAN RATHJEN
ALL IN THE FAMILY? I was sitting with Mark Byers on some wooden stools at a riverside Tiki Bar overlooking the Potomac River in Colonial Beach, Virginia. We were parked for the night and Mark and I were in deep conversation, while Shira and Betsy were in theirs. While there, several 1% club members had pulled up and were busy carousing and enjoying the mid-summer feel to the day. On the other side of the parking lot, a couple on a Gold Wing rolled up. I watched as they parked and spotted the two young people – guy and gal - riding down the street on small machines, a scooter of some type and a Kawasaki Z125. All this got Mark and me talking about how different, varied, wide and sometimes strange our motorcycling world is. And it really is; and we are different in the way we consider riding and motorcycles. A few days later I got into another conversation with a rider at a dealership in Fredericksburg. Homer has been a long-time customer at Morton’s BMW – a fine shop indeed – and has lived in Europe, Asia as well as being a citizen of the Estados Unidos. He, too, brought up the same subject and we discussed how motorcycles, riders, and riding are perceived in different regions and parts of the globe. We both agreed how accepted two-wheels are in some places, and thought of as a bit reckless and rebellious in others, and used as basic transportation in many third world nations. In Europe, for instance, the moto-culture is part of everyday life, and as
nearly everyone has or had a motorcycle or scooter and certainly knows someone who rides. Motorcycles are almost always given a courteous right of way and most times filter to the front at stoplights; as bikes accelerate away quickly when it goes green. In the U.S. this just seems to piss drivers off. In many nations, I have seen entire families on small machines. Dad at the helm, mom behind him, and two other kids squeezed onto the saddle as well. Oh, and the baby upfront on the tank held by mom around the father’s waist. Although riders like to say we are one big two-wheel family, other than the two wheels I have nothing in common here. Most of my non-riding friends and family have no clue to the difference between big touring rigs like the Road King and the young buck on the GSXR. We all look the same to them. But the same diversification exists in the auto world as well. Many of us have multiple motorcycles in the garage. I know many drivers that have a Ford F-150 parked next to their Corvette. Shira has her Suzuki V-Strom 650XT – her warhorse as it were - and her Honda 9191 – her funbike. Parked next to it is her Audi A4 Cabriolet. As most who ride, also have automobiles, we are fairly aware that there is a wide world of four-wheel vehicles on the road and that most drivers do not think of the ride in the same way that we do. And, like the motorcycle world, these drivers have different paradigms about why and how they drive. The Porsche, Corvette, and Mustang drivers probably will have a different thought pattern when it comes to their cars and how they operate them compared to the Ford Fiesta and Toyota Pius drivers. I know many people who do not ever think about their cars in any other way than a conveyance to get from Point A to Point B; although many wish to do so in the most comfortable and trendy way possible. Interstate truckers think of driving in an entirely different light. Continued on page 11
