About My Dad & Motorcycles

My dad would tell you that anyone that rides a motorcycle is stupid. He can't figure out why anyone would risk braking their neck. I know that Mom and Dad had friends when I was growing up who had a son that was killed on a motorcycle. I think it was a dirt bike off road, but that's immaterial I suppose. And, Dad has recounted to me several times his seeing motorcycles racing at the Marion County Fairgrounds and a guy wrecking and the the red hot exhaust pipe that had a baloney cut, impaling him. He says he doesn't know if the guy survived it.

So Dad pretty much has a negative opinion of motorcycling, bat at the same time, when my Dad first saw my motorcycle, he looked at it a long time and was clearly admiring it and said, "It really is a beauty." And when I rode it to Mom & Dad's house last October (2206) while going to a Bill Glass Day of Champions in Akron, Dad had already told his neighbors that I was coming on my motorcycle and when I showed up, he immediately got on the phone and called them to come and look at it. So I guess he wasn't embarrassed to have a son riding a bike.

I've certainly heard him say that other people are fools for riding motorcycles, but he has never once said anything derogatory to me about my riding one.

This seems somewhat of an enigma, but I guess on one hand he sees that they can be deadly, and on the other hand, he can see how they would be fun, and you just have to admire the man-and-machine thing that motorcycles exemplify.