As with most other children, our primary mode of transportation was the bicycle. Growing up, we rode a wide array of bikes, from stingrays to ten speeds. What separated us from the other kids in the neighborhood was an attitude that our father had instilled in us: Anything worth doing was only done to the best of your ability; push yourself in all endeavors, be it in school or at play, and constantly test your limits. Unfortunately, when we tested our limits outside of school, we were usually testing the P’s[1] just to see how much we could get away with.     Of the three of us, I was the last to learn to ride, even though I was the oldest. I could never quite master cycling.  Rather, the bike dominated me.

One cycling game that was very popular in the neighborhood was high speed skidding. Since we weren’t allowed to ride bikes in the street, we stuck to the sidewalks. One of us would come down the long, steep driveway of the Baker’s, which was our next door neighbor to the above us,  making  a sharp left turn on the sidewalk, trying to maintain as much Momentum as possible. Our driveway and the Taylor’s were side by side and were separated only by a narrow strip of grass. The idea was to cut the corner of our driveway, cross the short stretch of grass, then hit the brakes to see who could come closer to the rail fence that ran the perimeter of the Taylor’s front yard.

There were only two hazards on the course. First if you hit the brakes too soon on the grassy stretch, more than likely the back of the bike was going to slide out from under you, in which case the Taylor driveway was going to eat you up and spit you out. Then, there was the classic wait to long to hit the brakes, in which case you had to slide the bike out from under you purposefully with the same results. All of us at one time or another were sidelined with major brush burns to various parts of the body due to encounters with Mr. Driveway.

The bike of choice, when playing this game, was the stingray. This bike had high handle bars and coaster brakes on the rear wheel. All you had to do was push back on the pedal to lock the back wheel and you could put the other foot down to help with the balance. This also gave you a distinct flair when performing the stunt. The drawback to the game, in the P’s eyes, was wear and tear.

Yeah, we definitely went through a lot of tires and skin, but they were more concerned about clothes. Ultimately, each crash resulted in torn pants at least and quite often a ripped shirt. To this day, I can recall how most of these encounters were handled by Mom .

“Mom my, Mom my, Mom my!!!! Kyle just fell off the bike!” Carrie came running into the house.

Mom  showed no concern.  She continued doing whatever she was doing at that particular moment.  “How did he do it?”she would finally ask,  realizing that Carrie was still standing there. She might begin to hear C.J. crying,  shuffling up the driveway.

“He just fell,” Carrie said. Mom  knew better. We didn’t  just happen to fall.  Either one of us had done something to instigate the fall, or, more than likely, we got carried away doing something reckless.

C.J. would come in blubbering away, showing either his elbow or knee.

“Look at your pants. You ruined another pair,” Mom  would start.

Whoever was crying would look at her as if she were some sort of moron. We wanted attention to our injury, and all she was worried about were the clothes.

“But Mom, look at  . . . ” the injured party would claim.

“I don’t want to hear it. You probably got what you deserved. Try being a little more careful.” Mom  learned early to examine the injury from afar with a quick glance when you entered the room. You didn’t even realize  that she looked. She could tell almost instantly if the wound needed medical attention. If the injuries were just flesh wounds or scratches,  she would continue with her housework.

“But Mom, it hurts.”

“It’s far from your rear end.  You won’t be sitting on it,” she would reply.

“But Mom, look at it.”

“If it hurts that badly, I guess you can’t go back out to play” she would say. At this point, there was really no sense in pursuing the subject  any further. When she turned, more than likely the injury had miraculously healed, and the injured party was gone.

On one day, it seemed as if the entire neighborhood was making runs down the hill. On such days there was usually quite a bit of congestion and more than one person making a run at the same time. Things got really hairy then, and unless the noise level became too unbearable, the P’s usually stayed indoors.  Two old sayings were considered sacred by the parents. The first was, “what you don’t see can never hurt you,”followed closely by  “Out of sight, out of mind.” It wasn’t uncommon for several pileups to occur during the day, resulting in damage to both kid and machine. Consequently bikes, and sleds, had to be replaced almost on a yearly basis. Somebody was always sharing a bike with someone else, because at least one bike was parked waiting for dad to make the necessary repairs. The wait was usually several weeks long, and Mom nagging him to complete the job. On this particular day, I was without my bike.

“I wanna go first C.J.,” I said as I got the bike out of the garage.

“No sir, Tommy. It’s my bike,” C.J. replied.

“But you broke mine last night. So I should have the first turn. If you didn’t ride over the board, we wouldn’t have gotten the flat.”

“Well, Dad said this one is was all fixed.,” C.J. said as I hopped on the bike and headed toward the Baker’s driveway. Neither one of us had gone over the bike to make a safety check. As I got to the top of the driveway, I sat and watched for a few minutes until C.J. walked up beside me.

“You’re sure you want to go first?”

“I said it and I meant it.”

 Just then, Billy took off down the hill, made the turn at the bottom, cut the corner and hit the brakes. His timing was perfect. The skid mark started at the edge of the grass and went completely across the drive.

“Yahoo!!!!” Billy whooped, shaking his fist triumphantly in the air.

“Look at that!” C.J. said in awe. Billy was the oldest of the group and C.J. was the youngest. C.J. worshiped the ground that Billy walked on and tried to imitate all of Billy’s actions. This usually got C.J. in trouble.  But today he was content to let me try.

“Bet you can’t do better than that,” C.J. challenged.

“Bet I can,” Carrie said and shot down the hill. She cut the corner and jammed back on the brakes just a split second before hitting the driveway. The tail end of the bike came out from under her and she put her foot down to maintain her balance. She had saved it and was greeted by a round of  applause from the onlookers.

“Nice job Carrie,” Erica said.

“Well go on Tommy, or are you chicken?” C.J. was getting impatient.

“Let him be C.J.. Let him get ready,” Kyle said.

“Well here I go . . . ” I pushed off down the hill.

When I got to the bottom of the hill, I pushed lightly back on the brakes to slow my progress. The bike didn’t slow in the slightest, in fact I was still gaining speed.

“Look out! Get out of the way! Clear the road, I’m coming through!” I hollered.

“Man, look at him go. He didn’t even slow at the bottom of the hill. He’s got a great run going,”Kyle said.

C.J. laughed.  “I think he’s got a problem. Tommy can’t ride that good on his best day.”            C.J. was right. How I maintained control of the demon bike at the bottom of the hill was beyond me. The fact that I even made the turn was nothing short of a miracle. I guess Dad had not adjusted the brakes as I had thought. When I cross the grass, I plotted silently, I’ll just jam hard on the brakes and see if I can stop this thing. If I can’t, I’ll just try to turn up the Taylor’s driveway and put my feet down to stop.

I crossed the grass, jammed on the brakes, and there was nothing. I was still hurtling for the fence. Just then the back of the bike wiggled and I thought I was a goner. I really didn’t want to crash and burn on that driveway. It could definitely do a number on the body. As I gained control of the bike, I congratulated myself on my prowess.

“Look out for the fence!” everyone cried in unison.

I looked up just in time to watch the bike come to a complete and sudden stop at the fence. Unfortunately for me, I was still moving at a very high rate of speed.

“Aighhhhhhh!” I cried as I sailed over the fence with the greatest of ease. I did a perfect land and roll across the front yard. I would have survived the crash with relatively few injuries had I had just remembered to do one thing . . .  let go of the bike! The bike followed me like a playful puppy. I landed, and it jumped right on me. We rolled, tumbling simultaneously. It was such great fun I thought it would never end.

“Let go Tommy. Let the bike go!” they screamed.

We came to rest halfway across the front lawn.

“Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!  Come quick! I think Tommy’s dead!” Carrie screamed. As I lay there, my world finally stopped spinning, the birds stopped chirping, and I opened my eyes to see C.J. and Kyle looking down at me–laughing.

“You can let go now,” C.J. said.

“You shoulda at least tried to use the brakes,”Kyle laughed.

“What brakes? There are no brakes,” I groaned.

“You mean there was no brakes,” Billy laughed.

“What d’ya mean, was?” I stammered.

“Because there is no bike left, there can’t be any brakes” Billy guffawed.

 Just then, Mom came out of the house.  She looked a little shaken. I was just getting into the sitting position. I looked over my body and there were cuts and brush burns on top of cuts and brush burns and dirt clinging to everything. Just then I started to cry because I just knew I  had to be hurt.

“Just look at yourself,” Mom  scolded me. “You just ruined that shirt and pants, and that bike is a mess. I don’t know what I’m going to do with you children. Now get in here and change.”

I got up and went to push the bike back to the garage.

“No sense bringing that piece of junk to the garage. Just leave it out front for the garbage man. That bike is beyond repair” Mom  turned and headed back into the house.

I just shook my head and shuffled to the front door trying not to cry while everybody laughed at the sight of me.

Being kids, its only natural to have certain biking accidents, and we did. However, there are crash and burns that are more memorable than others. I was usually on the receiving end of these crash dummy experiences.

One of my more memorable experiences occurred while we were living at Tyburn, PA. It was a typical spring day, bright and sunny with a chill in the air. We were testing C.J.’s new ten speed that he had gotten for Christmas. We were taking turns riding down the street that was out in front of Garley’s. The road went down a very steep grade initially, then leveled out. It started to rise gradually to crest another hill about a half mile away. Between both hills there was a dirt road that circled the lake. Being that it was C.J.’s bike, he was the first to ride. He took off down the hill, shifted into high gear, and cruised to the dirt road and returned.

“Man, this is the fastest bike. Bet ya I was doing twenty-five or thirty miles per hour,” C.J. said.

“My turn,” Carrie said and sailed off down the hill, her long hair streaming behind her.

She was gone only a short time and returned.  “You’re right. This bike sure does fly. Wait to ya try it. Its awesome,” Carrie said.

I mounted the bike and pushed off down the hill. Soon the breeze was whipping through my hair and bringing tears to my eyes. It was quite an exhilarating feeling to be traveling at such a high rate of speed. Then the speed started to affect my vision, or at least that was what I thought, because it looked like the front wheel was ahead of the bike. Nah, can’t be. Just a figment of my imagination.

“Tommy, look out there’s a car coming up on you,” Carrie hollered.

This was not necessarily a major concern.  I turned my head to see just how close the car was. The car was closing fast, so I figured I needed to get to the shoulder in a hurry. Well as I turned my head back to the front of the bike, I realized I was in serious trouble. Either I didn’t pedal fast enough to keep up with the front wheel or the front wheel decided to continue without me. In either case, the results were going to be the same; a painful encounter with Mr. Roadway.         
I pedaled all the faster at the same time as I was leaning as far back as I could, trying to pull on the handle bars and do a wheelie. Who am I trying to kid I thought, I couldn’t do a wheelie on a tricycle, much less a ten speed. The forks (which are the wheel-abandoned front frame sections) were edging closer to the road. Just then a car horn blared and I remembered the car behind me.  My palms began to sweat and I started to laugh. Nothing like adding just a touch more intrigue to an already exhilarating experience. Suddenly, the forks dug into the asphalt and the handle bars were wrenched from my hands. I was tossed from the saddle like a dude being tossed from a bronco. I did my best tumbleweed routine and landed about a hundred yards further up the road. Not to be outdone, the bike was also going through a tumbling act and came to rest about ten feet from me.

Again the car horn blared.  At first, I just started to crawl off the road, because I didn’t want to become a road pancake.  Then I remembered the bike. Man, C.J.’s going to kill me if the car runs over his new bike, I thought. With my head still swimming, I crawled toward the bike and grabbed the handle bars. I looked up as the car was bore down on me.  It seemed as if the driver had no intention of slowing. There was no way I was going to drag the bike and me off the road without us becoming one with nature. I did the only thing I could do–I hurled the bike toward the shoulder. I then crawled for all I was worth since I still didn’t have the ability to stand. Soon as I hit the grass, I rolled on my back and groaned.  The car roared past. I looked up just in time to see the front wheel.  The driver, clearly intent on continuing to the next county unimpeded by the fact that both the rider and the remainder of the bike were in a heap on the side of the road.

I opened my eyes a few moments later to see Carrie and C.J. looking down on me.

“You dead yet, Tommy?” Carrie said.

“He’s going to wish he was dead when I get through with him,” C.J. hissed. I could see that C.J. was not in a very good mood.

“What ‘ya do to my bike?” he screamed at me.

“I didn’t do anything,” I stammered.

“Where’s the front wheel? I don’t see the front wheel.”

“Probably in Philadelphia by now. Did you guys fall in a hole or something? Didn’t you see what happened?” I whined.

“All I know is one minute you were riding along, the next minute you’re crawling off the road, and all I see is my new bike reduced to scrap in less than thirty seconds. Where is the front wheel, Tommy?”

I started to get to my feet.  “Last time I saw it, the darn thing was going up over that hill. You want it, you go find it. Far as I’m concerned, you can keep that demon bike. The thing has a mind of its own, and I’ll be darned if I’m going to keep letting that bike ride me.”

I started walking toward the house.  I realized I was either not quite right in the head, or a complete waste of talent in the cycling department. While most kids try to increase speed and performance of the bike, I was looking for ways to tame the beast.  What in the world did I need a ten speed for? I only need two speeds, slow and slower. Any more than that and I’d be living on the edge, and according to my last tally I only had one or two lives remaining. At this rate, I thought, I’ll be lucky to survive to until my next birthday.

[1]Parents, abbreviated. We used it as if there were two opposing teams–the kids, and the P’s.