Memories Stirred By A Bicycle

When I was young I biked a lot. That was the main mode of vehicle transportation in my area if one had no driver's license. A lot of walking, too. But for distances of more than a mile bicycles were the main mode of transport.

I seldom biked far from home, though. Couldn't go east. There was no road. To go east one had to a mile to the north or go south. There wasn't much to the south, and it wasn't long going in that direction before coming to the farm with the two big dogs who liked to bite. They were smart enough to take the angle, too. So I only went a short way to the south. West wasn't much better. For years I was forbidden to cross the railroad tracks which marked our property line. Five hundred feet. Wow.

This left north. It was a straight shot of one mile to get to the little town with the general store, tiny ball field, and creepy old abandoned creamery. But I seldom went much further than that. From the village I could bike around the "lake" to my friend's house, about two miles away. The lake was hardly that anymore. Once, I am sure it was beautiful. Now it was just a pond set back a few hundred yards in the midst of a circle of cattails and other assorted weeds.

The road heading north out of town eventually turned to the west and crossed the railroad there, too. So for about five or six years my biking was in a fairly small box. And then I entered junior high.

Seventh grade was memorable not just because I got to bike farther, but because I found a reason to bike farther. Seventh grade was the year they forced us to square dance during the winter months.

Wasn't keen on square dancing. What I was keen on was baseball. I played it all year round. During the winter months I would lay on my bed and toss a rubber ball up against the wall near the ceiling. Did that for hours, much to the consternation of my siblings. Knocked down some plaster in the process, too. They used to call me "Charlie Brown", because I often stood outside throwing my baseballs or hitting them.

Then, in the winter of 1970, I discovered something to compete with my love of baseball. Vicki.

I don't think it was the same Vicki from first grade, but that didn't matter. After a couple of weeks of random partner assignments for square dancing I got so I dreaded going to phy-ed. Then I was paired up with Vicki. Don't know why I noticed her, but I did. And for some reason that was a day when they didn't have us change partners, so I got to dance with her the whole hour (forty-five minutes). From that day on I always went to phy-ed with the hope I would again be paired with her. Never was.

I learned all I could about her (without actually talking to her). Turned out she had been in choir with me for five months and I hadn't even known it. Found out from a casual friend that she lived in the town north of mine. A six or seven mile bike ride. So, one beautiful Saturday morning, I got on my bicycle and headed north.

Got my first check about halfway there. Two dogs came out to greet me. One was a tiny little black thing. The other was a very large Great Dane. There was no barking, and they came out slow so I wasn't concerned and just ignored them. Until the big dog grabbed hold of my pocket and tried to pull me off my bike. The next thing I knew I was being chased down the road. I would have to find a new way home.

Once I reached the town where Vicki lived I realized I had no clue as to which house was hers. So, in typical Bevie fashion, I continued to bike up and down streets in the forlorn hope she would find some reason to step outside. Amazingly, she did. Turned out she lived at a corner house. She was out hanging up laundry. I stopped my bike on the road, fully intent on turning into her driveway to speak with her. But fear was my master and I didn't move. She would look at me every time she bent to take another article of clothing from the basket. But I finally realized I had no courage and started thinking about how I was going to get home.

I chose a long route to the west. This seemed like a good plan. Instead of a seven or eight mile ride I would be going fifteen to twenty miles. Didn't care. Until I was leaving the town where my high school was. I passed a place in which about twenty boys were lounging around. None of them were my friends so I just kept biking. Then, one of them showed up at my side and tried to kick me over. Had it just been him and me I would have stopped and handed him his a*s. But had it just been him and me he never would have dared do that. As it was, even I knew better than to hang around with those odds. Once again I was being chased. At least this time I was on the side where I lived.

I tried biking along the eastern route, but that meant biking along the highway. That had its own dangers. So eventually I wound up using the railroad. What was interesting was that I lived next to the tracks on the east side, and she lived next to the tracks on the west side. One time I found the courage to go to her door and knock. Nobody was home.

There's always problems with biking. Dogs. Creeps. Cars and trucks. Loonies. Heavy wind and steep hills. Horseback riding is like that, too. Only you can go a lot farther before you get tired. (Yes, you get tired riding horse. Your legs do, anyway.)

Oh, and I spent the next six years wishing I had the courage to speak with Vicki. Never did, until the final week of school my senior year. We shared study hall as the final class of the day. The teacher allowed us to spend the time signing each other's yearbooks. Realizing I had finally run out of time for good, I made myself go sit beside her and asked her if she would sign my book. Since I was also the class clown and known for my practical jokes and such, she insisted I sign her book first. So I took it back to my desk and filled a page telling her how I had spent six years wishing I dared talk to her. And now it was too late. (She was engaged to be married.)

She wrote something really sweet back. I don't have it anymore. About a year after I gradulated I was still living at home. My mother got mad at me and tossed all my yearbooks into the garbage. They're all gone now. What is left are the memories in my head. Every so often something happens and the door to an old room opens and I see the past again. Got a new bike now. Some old and creaky doors have been opened.

I wonder whatever became of Vicki. It's been thirty-five years since I left high school. In some ways I feel so different. In others, it's like I've not aged a day. I wonder if that's good.