by Alexander Mark

Created on: July 31, 2008

Danger,... will be your middle name. The first thing to consider is the rapid fire environment you will be entering. Remember that couch you saw late at night on the freeway last week? Hitting that in a car could be bad, but hanging your boots over a seventy mile-an-hour two wheeled speed machine and hitting that same couch will turn you, the wanna-be couch potato, into something akin to hash browns covered in lots of ketchup. The wonderful flip side is, riding that same powerful two wheeled rocket on steroids, will allow you to escape certain death with a well timed twist of the wrist and a quick maneuver around the angel of death and through the horde of traffic that pushes in on you at every side.

Have you ever ridden a motorcycle? What about a bicycle? Okay, there are similarities, but forget about it, they're nothing alike. A motorcycle in its basic form, is in fact a gas powered bicycle. But riding it is a whole new experience. The first thing you will probably feel when riding a motorcycle for the first time is fear, and joy. Fear is good. Even as you gain experience, it never really leaves you, it gets pushed to the back of your mind, but it's still there. And that is good because fear is the thing that lets you spot couches on dark freeways, crazy drivers that want to kill you, and even that little paddle that fell off of the kayak strapped to a Tahoe-bound SUV. That is also the reason you feel so alive when you get home. You're wound up, you feel like you've been where no one else goes, that twilight world in which only motorcycle riders go, and exists between the planes of Earth and Heaven. The other ethereal force affecting your state of mind when riding a motorcycle is power. Rolling on the throttle seems to accelerate you into heart pounding bliss, every single time. And it is this element that gives you that sense of freedom. You can speed away from slow drivers, maneuver around Texas roadblocks and slip in between the no-man's-land of car to car corners. I don't advise it though, one slip up by the rider or even worse, the driver who does not see you, and you're toast.

So now you know about the thrill. What about practicality? A decent motorcycle will get you fifty to sixty miles to the gallon. When you fill your tank for twenty bucks instead of sixty dollars for the same distance, euphoria sets in, and one must be careful to save the victory dance for the bathroom mirror lest you embarrass yourself in front of the other gas station patrons. Gas

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