Forrest Gump and his Harley/5 days in May

Guest Post by Unreconstructed

I was raised in a small country town in Louisiana.  We hardly ever traveled other than to visit   relatives so I never got to see much of the world.  Outside the local courthouse there were the recruiting posters for each branch of the armed forces whose offices were located in the inside.  The one that I was fixated on every time we passed by was for the Navy.  “Join the Navy and See the World” it said.  Long lanky sailor in his dress blues on the dock with his sea bag.  Old wooden sailing ship in the background.  Only goal I ever had in life.  Join the Navy and see the world and get the hell out of that small town.

Only problem was I graduated high school at 17 and parents would not sign for me to join.  They wanted better for me.  I was going to college whether I wanted to or not. I told them they were wasting their money.  I told them soon as I turned 18 I was out of there.  Long story short, it didn’t work out for me that way.  Never got to join the Navy.  Never got to see the world.  Life just got in the way.  First the wife then the kids (not complaining) then next 45 years in the oilfield to support the family and you know the story.

My father’s mother died when he was just a boy.  He was a rebellious teenager and he and his step mother did not see eye to eye and it all came to a head when he was 15 years old.  They decided it would be best if he would carry his act a little farther down the road.  So he left home and traveled around.  He would tell me stories of hopping freight trains and going to Kansas and other places, getting jobs on farms, living in hobo jungles, and basically doing what he had to do to survive.  His stories always piqued my interest and my wanderlust.

After my father retired from the oilfield he wound up being a commercial hay baler by default and I was his assistant.  Many times in going to a hay job the time coincided with the freight train stopping in town and if long enough it would block the road I had to travel with the tractor and equipment.  So I would have to sit and wait for it to move before I could proceed.  Back in those days the trains still went down the tracks with the doors open on empty freight cars.  Often I would find myself staring at an empty boxcar and wondering where it would wind up.  Wishing I had the guts my father had; get off that tractor and hopping me a freight and getting the hell out of that small town.

When I was a teenager there was a television show some may remember “Then Came Bronson.”  It was about a young man named Jim Bronson, played by Michael Parks, who just traveled around the country on his motorcycle doing odd jobs and just basically going where he wanted to go, doing what he wanted to do.  No obligations, no responsibilities.  In the opening scene to every episode you see him cruising down some California highway on his bike.  He pulls up to a red light and stops.  There is a man in a car next to him at the light.  You can tell he is a member of the rat race.  He asks Bronson, ”Where you headed?”  Bronson looks down the highway and replies, “Up there I guess.”  The man would reply, ”Man I wish I were you.”  To which Bronson would say, “Well you hang in there.” How cool is that?  I wanted to be like Jim Bronson.

I found an old Navy recruiting poster on E-bay.  Basically the same one I used to focus on as a young man.  I framed it and hung it on the wall in my man cave as a constant reminder, “You ain’t getting any younger.”  The wander lust is still just as strong 50 years later.

For any of you that know, working shift work as in 7/7, 14/14, or 28/28; your marriage will adjust to the same schedule.  You do your time at work the wife has her time at home and when you come home and you and the wife have your time together.  Any extra days at home as in vacation time, you begin to infringe on the wife’s time.  You know pretty quick when it’s time to go back to work.

I’ve been retired for three years and it’s been quite an adjustment but we have made the transition somewhat OK.  I have my man cave and I know when it’s time to “go drink coffee with myself.”

Well last week I got my taxes paid and could think of no other obligations plus I could tell the time had come that the wife needed a little space.  I threw some clothes in my bike bags and announced I was going to take my motorcycle for a ride.  That’s when the spirit of Forrest Gump and Jim Bronson overcame me.  I rode to the end of the city.  Then I decided I would ride to the end of the parish (we don’t have counties.)  When I got there I decided to ride to the end of the state (Louisiana.)  When I got to Texas I decided I had come this far I might as well keep on riding.  (There is a sign on I-10 in Orange, Texas I have passed hundreds of times,  El Paso 859 miles.)  I decided I’ll just ride across Texas (Texas isn’t big, it’s huge.) and when I got to El Paso I said, I might as well go to the Pacific Ocean and I kept on riding.

While in El Paso I noticed my rear brakes on my motorcycle were getting soft.  I rode to within 30 miles of the Arizona border and noticed the rear brakes were almost non-existent (total 1072 miles in two days.) After a restless night trying to sleep with the idea of playing dodge car in San Diego/Los Angles with compromised rear brakes, I made the decision to seek repairs and head back to Louisiana.

No repairs/parts were available over a large area of West Texas and New Mexico, and if they had to be ordered it would take a week to get them.  I decided to limp back home taking a different route, avoiding the large cities of El Paso, San Antonio and Houston.  Took a more Northerly route back.

(Oh. Did I mention, several times while filling up with gas people would ask, “Where you headed?” And in my best Jim Bronson manner I would answer, “Oh, I don’t know, West, guess.” (It would make my day.)

Two more days and another 1200 miles I’m getting my brakes repaired in Beaumont Texas.  Found out that Harley recommends flushing out brake fluids every two years. (No one ever told me.) Mine still had the original fluid from 2006 when the bike was new.  When they were flushing out the front brake the caliper locked up with trash.  Then I realized how lucky, fortunate, blessed I was to get back alive and in one piece.

For 5 days I did nothing but ride, check into motels, and pore over my maps and plan the next day.  I can only go so far between fill-ups.  At 150 miles on the odometer there had better be a gas station in sight. Across West Texas and across the New Mexico desert, stations are sometime few and far between. Only TV I watched was the weather channel.  Like the old Simon and Garfunkel song lyrics, “I can gather all the news I need on the weather report.”

For 5 days there was no TV, no newspaper, no radio and almost no internet   I carried my Kindle and could sometimes get enough wi-fi signal to get Mapquest and help me plan my route, and yes I would sneak in a small amount of doom-porn from TBP if possible.  (You can’t give up everything.)  I had no news of anything going on in the world.  Had we invaded Iran or Venezuela?  Had the stock market crashed and I lost everything?  Had the president been impeached? I kept passing thru towns and seeing flags flying at half-staff. (Back home now and still don’t know who died.)

First day on route back brought me through the Lincoln National Forest.  I figured OK.  A forest will be a break from this desert I’ve been in.  Did not notice till it was too late the 9,000’ elevation complete with hairpin curves, switchbacks, and a tunnel.  Thirty miles of white knuckle driving with compromised brakes.  Several times you could see where vehicles had run off the road and knocked over trees and other vegetation on what little shoulder there was.  If I ran off the road, that Harley may not even make a mark.  The buzzards may not even be able to find my carcass.

Out in the desert I stopped to stretch my legs and give my ass a break.  Decided to take a picture and text it to my wife.  No cell signal.  (So that’s why all those trucks have the funny antennas; cell phone signal boosters.)  Now it dawns on me that if I have a breakdown I can’t call AAA to come get me and I’ve got 1 ½ bottles of drinking water and no food.  Did I also mention that I am seventy years old with a heart condition and on blood thinners.  If I laid that bike down just a bad case of road rash and I would probably bleed out in a few minutes

I got to thinking:  this could be possibly be the dumbest, most bone-headed thing I have ever done in my life.  Not just stupid;  double damn stupid.

Lessons learned:    Stay home, you’re 70 years old.  Never ride alone.  Plan the trip and then plan some more.  Learn to pay more attention to map reading.  Make sure your equipment is in tip-top shape. (You never realize how much you use your rear brakes till you push the pedal and there is nothing there.)  Take plenty of water.  Take more water. Have a back-up plan.  Have a back-up plan for your back up plan.

Is there a moral for this story?

Yes.

For five days I lived without TV, radio, newspaper, or the internet.  It can be done.  I try, whenever I can, to watch the National news every day.  I know it’s all BS but it’s interesting to what TPTB are trying to get me to believe.

For five days I saw the sights, smelled the smells.  Rehashed old memories.  Thought of things that I hadn’t thought of in years.

For five days I was:  “Going down that long lonesome Highway,”

“ Headed for the mountains and the plains.

Going down that long lonesome highway,

I was livin’ life my way.”

For five days and 2235 miles, I was a FREE MAN!!!

(Already planning my next trip.)

Unreconstructed

May 2019

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Anonymous
Anonymous

Need a partner, ha?

Paul
Paul

No television, smartphones, AI, internet and no media can only make you free. Propaganda is addictive.

Mary Christine

I love road trips. Not on a bike, though. My ass just can’t take it. Actually, it’s a bad hip. But that’s part of your ass, isn’t it?

We are taking a road trip beginning in late June. I can’t wait.

I don’t know who died, either. And I wasn’t gone. Does anyone else know? Seems like they fly the flag at half mast for just about anyone these days.

Reprobate
Reprobate

My ass just can’t take it. Actually, it’s a bad hip. But that’s part of your ass, isn’t it?

Could you post a pic of the affected area?

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)

What are you going to do with the pic, you juvenile delinquent?
If it works, I might try the same on T4C.

Mary Christine

Nope, I’m a prude but just ask EC what my boobs look like. He can tell ya, since he asked me not too long ago, I gave him a description.

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)

In other news, never look up Suzie q from back in the day on FB. She looks like her grandma and it will warp your fond memories of her.

James the Deplorable in Arkansas
James the Deplorable in Arkansas

Not like a golf ball in a tube sock I hope ?

Mary Christine

No, James. They don’t move. They are forever frozen in place. They will never sag, ever. In my coffin they will still be perky.

October Sky
October Sky

For five days and 2235 miles, I was a FREE MAN!!!

(Already planning my next trip.)

Your story made my day!

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)

What a great story, I run across these once in a while on TBP. They make me forget about everything as I focus on the little trip I take courtesy of the writer. It’s nice to go on a long trip and search the far recesses of the mind for forgotten memories and disjointed connections of things observed years ago. We all are Don Quixote sooner or later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FW2KN7Tz89s

Hardscrabble Farmer
Hardscrabble Farmer

That was a great story, very well told. It brought back so many memories of all the years I used to wander around the country going from gig to gig- way before cell phones- when you could literally vanish into America and no one but you had any idea where you were. That’s freedom.

Glad you made it home safe, thanks for sharing that it put a smile on my face.

Hollywood Rob

You all might enjoy this.

Unreconstructed
Unreconstructed

The poem was enough to get me going. Read the intro and immediately downloaded to my Kindle. Thanks

Robert (QSLV)
Robert (QSLV)

Every fall for 20+ years, 2,000 miles from N.J. to my hideaway in the badlands of New Mexico. 2-3 weeks vanished from the deep state. No T.v. No I phone, no computer. The 3 days driving gets harder every year, but when I stop doing this, I’ll be in the mountains for good.

Robert (QSLV)

WestcoastDeplorable
WestcoastDeplorable

When I used to ride I took a trip once over the Trinity Alps in N. California, East to West. The state hwy back then was some twisty-turny logging roads. And once I had a close call with a big logging truck. But about 1/2 way it was cool to shut the bike down and just listen to the forest and drink in the smells. Today, with how people are not-driving, you couldn’t pay me to ride a MC.

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)

MC is a prude, she wont post a butt selfie.

Charles J Lamb
Charles J Lamb

Hey there, enjoyed the story. Check out lonestarriders.com. we are mostly from the Collin County area North East of Dallas. I am the youngest at 55 years old. We have some pretty interesting rides that you might enjoy and we are pretty close to you too. All types of bikes welcomed and we do have some Harley riders.

There is a Yahoo news group and a Facebook. I’ve never been on that though.

Do get your maintenance finished up on those binders though as we can ride pretty spirited at times.

Charles

Gloriously Deplorable Paul
Gloriously Deplorable Paul

Well told.
I’ve managed a couple of long rides and lots of day trips and I commute 70 miles a day on the bike, but that’s not the same.
Even though a well thought out ride is always a good idea there’s something about the spontaneity of just going………

Years ago, long before the kids were born my wife would still go on rides with me. One Friday night my buddy had rode his Harley hard tail chopper over to the house and had dinner with my wife and I.

Afterward, he or I suggested a ride. My wife said OK so we geared up. Being winter in Southern California it rarely gets below the 40s but that’s plenty cold when you’re riding an unfaired bike with no heated gloves or vest (I don’t think those things existed in the early 80s).

We put sweat pants over our jeans for an extra layer, added layers under our warmest jackets and took off, him on his thundering Harley and the wife and I on my Yamaha 650.

Over Cajon pass (4100′) into the high desert. North on 395 to a restaurant at a casino in Adelanto for late coffee then east past El Mirage dry lake (where we used to ride dirt bikes) and eventually into Palmdale and Hwy 14.

It was freaking cold. Hands aching and faces numb (full faced helmets were just gaining popularity then) No wind, no clouds, city lights miles away looked like you could reach out and touch them.

And the stars! I’ve lived my whole life in the L A basin and between light pollution and junk in the air the night sky is spectacularly boring. I’ve always marveled at a clear night sky, the Magellanic Cloud in view. That night the sky was blazing with twinkling stars.

We were all probably bordering on hypothermia but being young and foolish we kept at it. Descending 14 from the high desert into L A seemed like opening the door into a warm room.

We got home in the wee hours exhausted but intact. Having kids soon after curtailed adventures like that but provide pleasant memories and stories to tell the younguns.

Hollow man
Hollow man

Cool

Anonymous
Anonymous

In 1994 my wife and I quit our corporate jobs hopped on a 37 foot cruising sailboat that I built and left Long Beach, Ca for Mexico. We sailed to Cabo San Lucas and 400 miles into the Sea of Cortez and after about 6 months returned to San Diego. A great trip but we just quit our jobs so needed to make the most of the situation. I shipped the boat to Florida and motored from Jacksonville to Miami via the ICW and then sailed to the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico and the USVI where we worked 2 years to rebuilt the cruising kitty. From there we hit the British VI, and almost all of the Windward and Leeward islands down to Grenada. I had charts and a visa for Venezuela but by that time I was getting bored so we turned around and sailed north stopping in Haiti and sailing 400 miles of the north coast of Cuba without seeing another sailboat! After 3 weeks in Cuba we ran out of cash and returned to the US. We put over 8000nm on the boat in almost 4 years. The best time of our lives. I was 45 when we left and had a wonderful wife to share the adventure with me.

Old Toad of Green Acres
Old Toad of Green Acres

Amen brother.
When the urge hits I usually go from Maine to Arizona, been doing it since ’73, well, because.
Cannot stand Airlines or motels anymore, TSA and fungus.
Pack the bike in a Promaster van or utility trailer, you will have something to camp in.
America the beautiful.

Uncola

For the last couple of weeks I’ve camped out in Angry Alley by that old familiar intersection of Depressed Lane and Pointless Boulevard. But reading this made me want to pull up stakes and start heading back to Good.

Thanks for that.
comment image

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)

We love you here, bro.

Uncola

?

Air hug
comment image

mygirl...maybe

sometimes it’s imperative, you must road trip. no bike but my trusty van is camp equipped…i either go to the ocean or deep west texas…all i own is a cheap flip ph. and computer, no teevee and i can hide pretty deep when it suits me…

nkit
nkit

What does your therapist say?

yahsure
yahsure

Those round antenna on big rigs are for the Qualcomm computer in the truck. A tracking and communication system. Harleys are kind of thirsty I found out. I have been to almost every state over the years. I find it funny how I keep meeting people who have never left their state in their lives.

KeyserSusie
KeyserSusie

I have a millenial nephew (by marriage) who lives above his father’s garage in Florida. And drives his father’s vehicle and is on dad’s phone plan. He is divorced with two small kids. And struggles to keep any job. And recently was stressed out about his first trip out of state to help a friend drive a car back from Cal. I think he was on the verge of balking he was so nervous. And feeling like a loser who has never traveled or road tripped.

As part of the military secular diaspora, I lost count of how many trips I made from Florida to Maine to California in the 50’s 60’s and 70’s. I have drove across Texas in a day, several times. El Paso to Houston. And Arkansas was a pit of a state back then…One trip was non stop from San Bernardino to Florida, pulling a 23 foot boat with my three year younger brother. We went through Mississippi the day after Hurricane Camille.

A year earlier drove across Texas with same brother in a 66 Ford Falcon with no AC. In the middle of August. I was stopped somewhere east of Amarillo by a cop for speeding. He had Born To Raise Hell tattooed on his hairy arm. He asked me what my father does and gave me a warning.

Years later I left Cal in a 64 Corvair, no AC in June with my friend and fellow military brat. Somewhere near the Red River Valley I blew a fan belt. No town for 50 miles. I left my bud with the car (and he ate up all the fried chicken we had to feed ourselves) and hitched a ride with man with a family and a camper who had the worst BO I had ever experienced. And returned to fix the air cooled engine.

When I left Denver at age 13 with my older brother, 17 in a Renault Dauphine we drove to Florida. I recall I left the only pair of shoes I owned at a roadside campsite where we spent the night and had to turn around and backtrack 25 miles. At another roadside campsite, really small with no facilities there was an old man with a teen aged female camped out too. I did not know what to think when big brother told me if not for me he coulda got some tang that night.

One evening we pulled off the long lonely road to bed down for the night. About 2 am a speeding freight train passed, 20 feet from where we slept. I had no desire to hop aboard.

As a child I was told my father’s father worked for the Railroad in the Caboose. How nice I thought. What I came to realize later on is he was a yard bull. A big man from the Gheechie Ghetto. Dad finally told me the truth. Grandads favorite tactic was a lead filled billy club to deal with the vagrants.

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)
We Shall Live in Interesting Times
We Shall Live in Interesting Times

Good story. Glad to see that the locals have finally warmed up to you.

KeyserSusie
KeyserSusie

You can have the road, I’ll take the sea.

wishes
wishes

thanks for the great story!

StackingStock
StackingStock

Great read and congrats on taking the adventure.

Did you stop at a waffle house? It’s the best on the road food.

Carry on and arm up.

The Deist
The Deist

Too bad you didn’t follow your dream. I joined the Navy @17+4days, did 26 yrs, and still on the “road” 27 yrs after retirement. But sometimes I still think I should have stayed down on the farm. Life’s funny that way.

Mistico (EC)
Mistico (EC)
Gloriously Deplorable Paul
Gloriously Deplorable Paul

Recently read of a retired guy who lives in Arizona. Every spring he rides his motorcycle north to Seattle or Vancouver and gets on a ferry for a several day boat ride to one of Alaska’s port towns. Leaves the ferry and goes to work at a resort run by one of the cruise lines for their passengers on Alaska land/sea tours.
In his off duty time he cruises the motorcycle around, sightseeing, camping and fishing.
At the end of summer when the cruise trips stop he reverses the process and winds up back in Arizona for the winter, having avoided the summer heat and earned a tidy amount of cash while traveling and seeing Alaska.
Pretty cool.

Vodka
Vodka

Thanks for the wonderful post! When you are 70 years old you definitely know a thing or two. I hope you will post more stories about your lifetime adventures.

Uncola’s poster meme was the attitude that I adopted a number of years ago. Your post has inspired me to jot down a few memories of my own for my kids to read. Thank you.

Stucky

I can read quite fast … which I did with your story …. well, until I got to the 3rd paragraph. Then I read it real slow not wanting to miss a word … and even paused several times trying to imagine in my mind what you were experiencing in real life.

What a wonderful and mesmerizing story!!! Thanks for sharing it with us.

Diogenes’ Dung
Diogenes’ Dung

Thanks for sharing. A lust for wandering should be carefully cultivated, then sated.

My 16th summer, in a moment of “My Way or the Highway!” (literally), mom laid down a gauntlet of obedience I couldn’t abide. We’d been living in Florida for a month. Dad was transferred to Mayport Naval Station and a guided missile destroyer after graduating from Monterey Naval Postgraduate School. He was deployed and mom was always a tyrant when he was absent. I left home without a penny, a small backpack with a canteen, sardines, crackers and a brick of cheese that disappeared quickly, and a hatchet for defense.

It took me a month to hitchhike back to California, taking odd jobs for cash when I could and stealing when I couldn’t. My 2nd day on the road I was picked up by a carnival caravan and worked for meals and a cot in a truck while learning that everybody is a sucker.

I lived on the street for nearly a year. I slept where I could find shelter away from people and never stayed anywhere for long. I met every kind of person one can, good and bad. It was sterling training for life, though I was down to 118 pounds when dad signed my papers to enlist in the navy.

I was lucky to survive it and I know I couldn’t today; I was hungry for life as a lad. I’ve still an appetite for unscripted living, but I get all I need hanging out in lawless Mexican towns.

Tactical Zen
Tactical Zen

When you are on the road with your bike it’s like going back to the 1850s West on horseback. Just you and creation and the road ahead.

Read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance on such trips.

God speed.

James the Deplorable in Arkansas
James the Deplorable in Arkansas

Thank you for the story. My life roughly like yours. I’m looking to fully retire in 24 months if the Joo’s don’t pull the financial rug out from under me otherwise I’ll keep working and pass away in the harness. I laughed a lot on this story and at the comments too. It is good medicine and I’m still grinning ! I should be able to get a good deal on a used Harley since a lot of the Boomers who proceeded me are getting too old to ride and having to sell their bikes. I’m a 53′ model and I learned some time back it’s not always best to be on the leading edge. Thanks again!

nkit
nkit

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