One Blond... One Swerve... One Ride... One Day

I used to think that there was no greater pleasure than to be standing alongside a gurgling trout stream as the first gray light of dawn filtered through the woods. Then I discovered what it was like to lay alongside a naked blond as dawn gently illuminated the details of her lithe body. While these two activities still remain high on the list, nothing compares with riding into the first glimmer of a new day on a screaming motorcycle. There is a coolness to the dawn air that transcends temperature. The atmosphere is still heavy with the mystery of the night, which slowly dissolves into an opaque reality, that gradually overpowers the bike’s headlight. It is like attending a religious service in which the benediction is read on the tachometer.

This time of the day is so special, that it is easy to understand why the concept of “60 miles” before breakfast is embraced by so many riders. What better way to start the day than to race the dawn and celebrate the daylight with a plateful of fragrant eggs, bacon, and home fries? And so I found myself rocketing along an interstate (binding rural New York State to Pennsylvania) in the sacred hour before daylight is established. My bike was a 1986 BMW K75 (with the rare Sprint Fairing). The needles on the tach and speedo were parallel in 5th gear, indicating a smooth, steady pace slightly above 80 miles per hour. The sky behind me was brightening as the gray, pre-dawn darkness before me gathered in pockets to make a last stand.

Technically this ride had begun after loading my gear onto the motorcycle in front of a chain hotel at 4:30am; but I was on my way home after ten days on the road and the scent of a woman was tightening my DNA. It wasn’t the actual aroma of a delicate perfume warmed by the heat of her body, but something much stronger: the memory of the last night we’d scorched that perfume together. A motorcycle is the ultimate escape vehicle, freeing a rider from the constricting bonds of daily life. Yet there comes a time when the ultimate escape is in the arms of a tanned, flaxen-haired blond, standing in that same driveway that launched the adventure in the first place. And it is the motorcycle that takes you there. 

Advance Sales Of Riepe's  New Book

Conversations With A Motorcycle

Are Going Like Smoke!!!!

 • Lower Numbers Are Already Gone! 

To reserve your copy, email your name, address, and phone number to jack.riepe@gmail.com, Mark the subject line: “Signed Moto Book Offer.” You’ll receive an invoice in the mail. Your book(s) will be shipped shortly after August 19, 2012. At present, book orders are limited to 10, which the author will gladly inscribe as individual gifts, as per your instructions. 

To hear the author speak about his new book
Conversations With A Motorcycle,
Click Here:

So I found myself wide awake an hour before first light, in a chain hotel, barely 200 miles from home, dealing with a hunger originating from a point below my stomach. “Time to go,” I thought, though there would be nothing to dull these pangs within 60 miles.

The three-cylinder engine on the BMW K75 is known for more of whine than growl when the throttle is twisted. That is the sound of the Valkyrie winding up for the pitch. It is the sound of an engine that will run at 95 miles per hour all day, without burning an ounce of oil. I didn’t need all day to get to where I wanted to be. At a comfortable 95 miles per hour, I would be home in two hours and ten minutes, barring intervention from the authorities.

Nowhere in eastern New York nor Pennsylvania is it possible to run at 95 miles per hour (for any great length of time, much less two hours) without getting arrested. But I have pushed the envelope more often than is ever wise. I love going like hell on smooth pavement in light traffic and letting the motorcycle hit its performance specs. Virtually vibration-free to start with, the K75 reaches its top cruising speed without the venom of a pavement predator and takes the sweepers as smoothly as a politician tells a lie. I can truthfully say “rare was the ride I didn’t take either of my two K75’s into triple digits,” but I can also make the claim that 85 to 90 miles per hour is my most comfortable gait (circumstances permitting).

Traffic was light to the point of non-existent, despite the fact that it was a weekday morning, and I was east of Scranton. The K75’s whine was more on the throaty side and I toyed with the idea of kicking things up a notch. While the temperature on a July pre-dawn run in eastern Pennsylvania might be a civilized 68º to 72º (F), the humidity can easily make things clammier than cooler. This was the case on this particular morning and pockets of mist lined sections of the road, clinging to the inside of some curves. The fun of running at 95 mph or better was spoiled by the thought of a stupid deer stepping out of some hidden glade, causing me to test the adhesion limits of my new Metzler front tire.

Have you ever noticed that some mornings start out with a burst of energy and a burning desire to get on with things, only to evolve into the conclusion that three hours and forty-five minutes’ sleep just isn’t enough to bankroll the day’s activities? I had barely been in the saddle 45 minutes when my eyes got that blurry feeling that accompanies a fleeting sense of regret that a perfectly good, and now empty, hotel room was in my immediate past. The right eye was worse than the left. It was focusing on a strange, dark, ill-defined mass in the right lane of Interstate 80 (I-80), which appeared to be doubling in size with every second.

The rider’s eye is quick to identify various threats such as oncoming locomotives, ships lost in the fog, flaming zeppelins, stupid deer, and mobs of flesh-eating zombies. The merest hint of these will send the bike and rider into an evasive swerve that will not only demonstrate a masterful handling of the machine, but conclusively prove it’s possible to cling to the seat by a clenched sphincter (which has contracted to the size of a buttonhole). But add a bit of mist or ground fog to something, robbing the image of a discernible shape, and the slightly fatigued rider might waste valuable nano-seconds trying to guess what the hell that thing might be.

I saw a shapeless, black mass looming out of the mist before me, and thought, “How odd is that?” It seemed to have corners for a second or two, and then not. It then seemed to have depth, and then not. To be perfectly frank with the gentle reader, I was also thinking of eggs and bacon, sizzling on a griddle, tended by my tanned, blond girlfriend, who would be surprised by my return, and agreeably padding around bare-assed in the kitchen. Thoughts like these get their talons in me and are not easily shaken, especially as the chances of this actually happening were about zip to none. (Stuff like this used to happen in my thirties and forties. I have been unsuccessful in perpetrating this scam in my fifties, but I’m working on it.)

I was 10 car-lengths away from the dark, shapeless mass (about a second and a half), when the full light of dawn bloomed like an orchid, clearly illuminating the threat in the road. I screamed so loudly into my Nolan helmet that I briefly succeeded in fogging the interior shield (judged to be impossible). 

Spanning the full lane in front of me, like the white-trash swimming pool from hell,  was the bed-liner out of some piece-of-shit pickup truck. Light plastic to be sure and a black hole for any motorcycle headlight, this unexpected debris would have swallowed the K75 in a heartbeat. My reaction was a vicious half-swerve to the left.  A full swerve might have bought me into the side of the bed-liner. I was past it in a flash, with my thoughts on survival, as I chopped the throttle to half and let the dynamic braking slow the bike.

I thought of pulling over on the shoulder, yet to what purpose? This happened in the blink of a dull eye. (I was 5 football fields away when the full impact of the situation hit me.) I wondered what would have happened if I had hit the bed-liner dead on?  Would the bike have just slammed through it? Would I have panicked and dropped the rig in the bed-liner? In which case, would I have slammed through the bed-liner with the bike on its side or just slid down the road inside the bed-liner?

I suspect I’d have slammed through the bed-liner, dropped the bike on its side, and come to rest in a ditch, ten feet away from a mob of flesh-eating zombies. Yet it is these sudden obstacles that add to the challenge of riding, and which make us appreciate our hidden skills. For example, I never knew I could say, “Mutherfucker” in 17 languages, until I swerved around that bed-liner.

I arrived home three and a half hours later. My blond lover was on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, sipping a cup of herbal tea. It was the second day of her period... The worst day for cramps.

“I’m just going to spend the day on the sofa,” she said meekly, with the smile that drove me mad. “I’m reading this book called The Red Tent. What are you going to do?”

“I might take a ride with Bregstein later,” I said. “Want anything from the diner?” 

Next Blog Episode:

"An Adoring Reader Gives  
Jack Riepe The Keys 

To A 1952 Vincent Black Shadow

In Exchange For Sexual Favors...." 

(But not from him...)

©Copyright Jack Riepe 2012

Your Chance To Own Literary History...

Thirty-five years of intense research... Six passionate affairs...  Five bike wrecks... Four motorcycles... Three crash and burn Life-Long Romances... And two literary careers have all led to one unique motorcycle book.

Conversations With A Motorcycle, by Jack Riepe, will be released on August 19, 2012.

Conversations With A Motorcycle begins where it began for Riepe, being seduced by the wind in a on-going two-wheeled escape that leads to adventure, euphoria, and romance, with intervals of introspective road rash. An unlikely biker in the mid-1970’s, his compulsion to ride is fueled by a drive to mate, two activities the author has forever linked. At nineteen, he has luck with both, but seldom at the same time.  This book recreates the volatile atmosphere of the moto-world in the mid-1970’s, when advancing technology clashed with traditional design and appeal.... And when the nicest people on a Honda met the leather and chrome crowd.  But Conversations With A Motorcycle is far more more than one man’s perspective of a misspent youth... It’s a philosophy of expectation for anyone thinking about become a rider; as well as a footnote of affirmation for the thousands of riders who learned about life and the road the same way — through the seat of their pants on a rock-hard saddle.

Regarding the misspent youth angle, Riepe said, “Youth is misspent if you have absolutely nothing to show for the investment. I had one hell of a good time. The details of those times are going to make a lot of readers smile and laugh. That’s more than Wall Street is going to do on a $20 investment. If I had to die tomorrow, I hope it’s in a tight curve on a screaming 1975 Kawasaki H2, with my first former mother-in-law on the pillion behind me.”

Conversations With A Motorcycle is dramatically different from Riepe’s usual style.

The lament of Riepe readers accustomed to his point-blank humor and abrupt style has been his penchant for the short story. Whether their preference is his monthly column in the nation’s largest BMW motorcycle club publication, or his libertine moto-blog Twisted Roads, the most commonly heard statement is, “I waited so long for this, and it was over so quickly.” (This comment was printed on tee shirts and sold by one of Riepe’s disillusioned lovers. One former Love-Of-His-Life, a sizzling blond, refers to the author as “The Disillusionist.”)
 



The short story yields to dependent chapters in Conversations With A Motorcycle. Each one sets the scene for the next in a two-year chronicle, incorporating a new literary device for Riepe — honesty — which brings a more humanistic dimension to his humor. While the settings and characters of the book will be familiar to anyone who reads Riepe’s blog, Conversations With A Motorcycle provides the hidden details and circumstances that constitute the torn fabric of his moto-history. For example, the chapter on his arrest for “Grand Theft, Auto” and “Assault With A Deadly Weapon,” (which led to his being detained in the “mental unit” of the local lock-up), is as compelling as his description of riding in the fog. Both are also true.

The result is nothing less than the seduction of the reader. Yet it is the anticipation of this seduction that attracts readers to Riepe’s work in the first place.

Each chapter details a turning point in the author’s cursed life.  While the view from the author’s pillion occasionally leaves the reader breathless, not every chapter ends happily. Riepe does not always lean far enough into the curve... He does not always get the girl... Nor does he always make the cop laugh... Predictability was never his strong suit.

The first 1,000 copies of Conversations With A Motorcycle is being offered as a limited hand-numbered, autographed, and inscribed edition — by advance subscription only. Priced at $20 (USD) each, with $5 (S&H), a hand-numbered numbered edition — especially with a low number — makes a great Christmas present, or a gift for any occasion.

To reserve your copy, email your name, address, and phone number to jack.riepe@gmail.com, Mark the subject line: “Signed Moto Book Offer.” You’ll receive an invoice in the mail. Your book(s) will be shipped shortly after August 19, 2012. At present, book orders are limited to 10, which the author will gladly inscribe as individual gifts, as per your instructions.

Nothing matches the uniqueness of a book personally inscribed by the author as a Christmas gift, birthday gift, or anniversary gift.

The first 100 advance book sales of Conversations With A Motorcycle sold out in less than an hour. Only prepaid books are part of the hand-numbered set.  Bike and riding clubs looking for unbroken numbered sequences (with the club name mentioned in the inscription) can still be accommodated at this time. One club representative should send an inquiry to jack.riepe@gmail,com, with “Riding Club Book Inquiry” in the subject line.

Giant Spiders and Motorcycle Deer Strikes

“I am through riding the Blue Ridge Parkway,” said Chris Jacarawycz. “This is the fourth time I’ve whacked a deer on this road, and the next one may whack me.”


Chris Jacarawycz is one of the finest motorcyclists I have ever known. Whether stirring up the dirt in backwoods Pennsylvania on a raging KTM, or taking a Honda Goldwing through twisties that would daunt a much nimbler bike, Jacarawycz is a biker’s biker. He carves through curves like a Renaissance sculptor, rendering gravel-coated corners into the moto equivalent of Michelangelo’s “David.” But all his skill couldn’t stop a large whitetail deer from from diving straight into the windshield of his Yamaha Super Ténéré — at point blank range.


“The deer came out of the brush in a dark brown blur,” said Jacarawycz. “My peripheral vision had barely scored the threat when the bike shuddered under a tremendous jolt. Broken plastic and bits of glass showered over me, as I fought for control. The front end started to wobble and the machine veered to the left. There was no opposing traffic and my thought was to keep it on the blacktop, while I brought the machine to a straight stop.”


He almost made it. The bike went into a front-end skid when the front wheel hit the grass, dropping Jacarawycz in a sliding dismount on the pavement. While not life threatening, his injuries would curtail his riding for the better part of the season. The event would prove fatal to both the bike and the deer. (Jacarawycz wears a full-face helmet and total ballistic gear.)


This was his fourth deer-strike, but only the first time he dropped the bike as a result of the impact. (His last encounter with a whitetail would severely damage the fairing of a Honda Goldwing, but Jacarawycz managed to hold the machine upright, precluding injury to himself, or the pillion rider. This was the outcome of two other deer strikes as well.)


“What could you have done differently to prevent this accident,” I asked him.


“Not a damn thing,” Jacarawycz replied.”It was broad daylight, in the middle of the afternoon, and the deer leaped from thick cover right at the edge of the road. It slammed into the bike a split second later. There was absolutely no opportunity to swerve nor to slam on the brakes.”


“What was your initial reaction?”


“I knew what happened instantly... My reflex was to hold the bike upright, assess the situation, and bleed off speed without slamming on the brakes. I was pretty confident that I’d get it stopped upright, but there was greater impact damage to the forks or front brakes than I anticipated and circumstances proved otherwise,” Jaracawycz said.


“What advice would you give to riders dealing with whitetail deer?”


“It’s the luck of the draw. I’ve heard that if you come across a deer in the road, you should aim for where the animal has been. This assumes that the deer is not the point-man in a column of whitetails, which is often the case. Then again, I’ve seen deer start slipping and sliding on the pavement, and turn around to go back the way they came. The animals do not always enter the road in a tentative stance, pausing to look around. Sometimes they just come barreling out,” said Jacarawycz.


And on a tight, mountain road, this can spell trouble for motorists in general, and bikers in particular.


Nothing gets people more fired up in the US than the manner in which nature is regarded, discussed, and managed. When it comes to wildlife, the average fat-faced American is a real dope, extending human attributes to creatures who coexist with each other in a hair-trigger state of nature. I got my first lesson in this subject 25-years ago, on a fishing trip with my pal, Ihor Sypko. We were camping on the shores of Round Valley, a reservoir in New Jersey, and had planned to launch a rowboat from a marshy area, adjacent to our campsite.


There was nothing compact about the aluminum rowboat, and we chatted as we carried it (by hand) down the access road to the water’s edge. It was a half-mile walk. We laughed as we sweated, making no effort to conceal our movements. About 200-yards from the water’s edge, I noticed a fawn in the undergrowth. It was a thing of beauty. All spindly legs and silvery spots on a tiny, tawny body... It was trying to stand.


“Holy shit,” I said. “I think that fawn was just born. I hope we didn’t spook the mother.”


“I didn’t hear a deer run off,” replied Ihor.


We then carried the boat to the water’s edge in stealth mode.


The fishing was fun. The average size of the fish we caught could have been mounted on a Ritz Cracker, although I did hook into something impressive— that got away. It was probably a Blue Fin tuna or a Marlin.  We returned to shore 4 hours later, sun-dried, bug bitten, and hungry. We were carrying the boat back, when I remembered the fawn.


It was still there, and none too happy-looking.


“Shit,” I said to Ihor. “This little thing needs our help.”


Because we grew up in New Jersey — the land of abundant civil authority — and because we were city kids (relying on the irrefutable truth of Disney’s “Bambi” for our knowledge of deer), we decided to notify the park rangers. Since cell phones were pure science fiction in the late ’70’s, Ihor lit out for the emergency land line, about a mile and a half distant. Our plan was to call in a medivac helicopter and to get the deer airlifted to Johns Hopkins University Hospital as fast as possible.


I figured they probably had a jet at a local airport standing by for this sort of thing.


Ihor returned a bit later, with the news that a ranger was coming.


“Why didn’t you just wait by the phone and ride back in the helicopter?” I asked.


“They didn’t say anything about a helicopter,” said Ihor.


“What the fuck?” I responded, dripping furious indignation. (This was long before the internet, so I actually said, “What the fuck,” as opposed to the letters W.T.F.) “Did you tell them this involved a baby fawn, who may have been alone in the hot sun for a minimum of four hours?”


“Yes,” said Ihor.


“Did you tell them how cute it is with spindly legs and silvery spots on a tawny body?”


“Yes,” said Ihor.


“Did you tell them the little guy is thoroughly disoriented, and barely responds to his name?”


“Yes, I did,” said Ihor.


“Did you tell them his name is Jerome?”


“No,” said Ihor. “I didn’t think of that.”


“Well,” I said pointing in the direction of the phone. “Get moving. It is emotionally draining for me to stand guard over this fawn while you go sight-seeing.”


Ihor had barely set off, when we both heard the drone of motorboat, churning across the lake. It grounded with authority, and a ranger in a gray uniform, with very official hiking boots, stepped out of the boat. Have you ever noticed how some people just look like their chosen profession? I mean, is there a law that all firemen must resemble professional football players in stature, and have the confident demeanor of Navy SEALS? (By the same token, elected officials look like street walkers in the time of cholera.) This ranger, whose name was probably something like “Ted Goodperson,” combined the looks of Robert Redford with the personality of Saint Francis. I remember thinking, “I could fuck my way along the entire Appalacian Trail, without having to buy a drink for any lingerie model, if I looked like this guy.”


The ranger introduced himself, glanced at our gear and stuff, then advised us to wait quietly while he sized up the situation. He went into the tall grass and looked at the fawn carefully, without touching it. Then he looked at the grass around the fawn, examed the underbrush, and then poked around in the adjacent stand of hardwoods. This took about 15 minutes. He concluded his investigation and waved for us to join him.


“This fawn was born dyslexic,” said the ranger, “a condition that will prevent it from standing or walking properly.” To demonstrate his conclusion, he gently picked up the fawn, and set it on its legs.


It promptly fell down. He did this two or three times.


“The mother sensed there was something wrong with the fawn, so she abandoned it. They don’t waste any time with unhealthy fawns,” said the ranger.


This was not the message I wanted to hear from Saint Francis in a gray uniform... That the does of New Jersey were nothing more than wanton slatterns, who popped out fawns that got abandoned on the filmiest of pretexts.


“Why wouldn’t the mother try to nurse it to health?” I asked. “Will she come back?”


The ranger hesitated for a bit, then delivered the gruesome punch line. “The unhealthy fawn will attract predators that may prey on the doe as well. So in the interest of species preservation, the doe has abandoned the fawn. She may have three or four others in the next three or four years.”


“So you’ll take Jerome here to the state park vet?” I pressed.


It was then the ranger looked at both of us, and gave a little sigh. He knew he was dealing with two city assholes who couldn’t handle the truth. With the gentle grace of a good shepherd, the ranger put the fawn across his shoulders, carried it down to his boat, and buzzed off across the lake.


Ihor and I had steak that night... Steak seared over an open fire... Steak carved from the ass of a steer that had been whacked on the head with a sledge hammer in some slaughter house... A steer that had been born in the night, on spindly little legs, just like Jerome. And we felt pretty good... Like a couple of sports who had just saved a deer. And we drank our fortified ginger ale, listening to coyotes that we didn’t know New Jersey had, howling across the lake... Where they were probably eating Jerome.


Because this is the correct order of things, in a state of nature, where the mothers abandon their young to the coyotes, feral dogs, farm dogs, and bears... And where the remaining entrails of those abandoned young feed turkey vultures, crows, mice, twenty-kinds of beetles, and two million fly larvae. (The fly larvae will ultimately grow into big, fat, disgusting, shit-squatting insects, that slam into clear-plastic motorcycle face-shields, creating a need for replacement parts, providing the nice people at Nolan with jobs.)


Now, why did I write all this stuff about deer-strikes and motorcycles?


I was running through FaceBook last week and under the heading of a rider I like and respect was this well-intentioned advice about how you can tell the difference between orphaned fawns and those that are just parked for a bit. The truth is, there is no difference. Leave them all alone. Either the doe will come back, or Mr. Coyote will. Nature takes care of its own. In many states, it is illegal to feed wildlife as this conditions them to humans and ultimately makes them better targets for those with shotguns or rifles, or for cars and motorcycles.


I wanted to ask the nice lady who was feeding two “orphaned” fawns,  "what she would do if she found a couple of orphaned tarantulas, or other huge, fucking killer spiders with hides?" Would she return with a baby bottle and nurse them to health? Tarantulas need love too. (I had a mother-in-law who was a giant tarantula.)

Suppose the great Disney movie “Bambi” wasn’t about a deer?

What if the hero of that movie had been a huge, killer spider, whose name was “BiBi;” who got lost in a winter storm and who found a kindly old blind person (a guy named “Dallas”), in a remote cabin; who then invited the spider in from the cold (thinking she was an odd breed of talking dog). And suppose BiBi discovered the cabin was infested by Norway rats (British accents), that shit all over the blind person as he slept (like Congress does to the nation), so she laid 22,000 eggs under the kitchen table. Each egg hatched in the pleasant environment of the cabin, and  all the rats disappeared over the course of a week. Suppose the movie ended with the kindly old person falling asleep each night under the warm protection of a living blanket of 22,000 tarantulas?


The title of the movie could be “BiBi Lays For Dallas.” 


This movie would be as factual as “Bambi.” And it would be perfect if the studio could get Noomi Rapace (Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) to be the voice of the spider.


Suppose that movie had been made and shown in the 1950‘s... Would we all be feeding orphaned tarantulas? Would we be pulling over on the Blue Ridge Parkway, and pointing in delight as resident tarantulas ate rare hummingbirds trapped in their webs?  Some dopes would. 

There are more deer alive and running around in the United States today than when Columbus discovered America. It makes more sense to feed cockroaches. Leave the deer alone. The fawn you’re feeding may injure or kill someone you know on a motorcycle. Wouldn’t that be swell?


As long as we’re supposing things, suppose cash-strapped states sold “orphaned” deer-feeding permits for $50, allowing well-intentioned, but dreadfully uninformed, people to feed abandoned fawns, provided the animals were ear-tagged, and that the permit-holders were liable for any motor vehicle or crop damage. Who would legally feed the deer then?


Now, do I expect anything I wrote in this blog episode to change the feeble mind of anyone who is feeding “orphaned” deer? Nope. But I do expect to get 10,000 emails from jerks claiming its time to ban motorcycles from the Blue Ridge Parkway, as they disturb the sugar-fueled deer. 


Philly Area Rider Wins Triumph T100, Compliments of Castrol....

Religiously changing his vehicle’s motor oil every 3,000 miles paid off big time for Fred Diehl, the winner of Castrol’s Triumph Sweepstatkes. Diehl accepted the keys to an iconic red and white, Triumph Bonneville T100, at a Pep Boys location in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, on Saturday, June 24, 2012.

Fred Diehl on his new Triumph Bonneville T100 -- Compliments of Castrol

“I have always used Castrol lubricants, in both my car and my motorcycle,” said Diehl. “I was buying oil in the shop and was intrigued by the promotion. So I went back to the office and entered the contest online. Winning this Bonneville T100 is the result of that effort.”


A Harley rider for more than 3 decades, Diehl had an instant appreciation for the T100’s retro appeal. “I have been without a bike for a while and look forward to the Triumph experience,” he said.  Diehl primarily rides on the weekends, but the Triumph, with it’s classic panniers has given him an idea for a longer run.


“My dream ride would be a run with no time-frames, no destination and no purpose, other than to enjoy the scenery and to relax without thinking of everyday problems. I want a short two-wheeled escape from reality,” said Diehl. This bike may make that dream come true.


When asked if he read Twisted Roads, Diehl replied, “I have never read the blog but I have heard of Jack Riepe and some of the strange stories he tells. No one can be that peculiar.”


I hope Mr. Diehl reads this whole blog and sends me a comment.


©Copyright Jack Riepe 2012
All rights reserved