I've been having a lot of anxiety or just plain terror at getting back on my bike. I hear this is normal but that doesn't help the feelings. What do I do when I have feelings to sort through??
I write them down so what better way than to write them here and work out my issues in my usual public way on a weekly basis.
Don't worry my ridiculousness will still follow between Wed and Fri.
As most of you know I started riding a motorcycle last April. In the beginning I was pretty apprehensive about it. 2 years ago my other half brought me home...for my birthday an 1971 BSA Thunderbolt. This was to be a build bike and I was pissed. He had asked me about the bike before hand and I told him no...emphatically. Not even an hour later a truck pulled up with the bike. I got over my anger pretty quickly though once I sat on it.
Build bike I could handle and she needs a lot of work. I figured I could take my time. Get to know how I felt about riding.
I stripped her down...yes her. Sexy Bitch is what I call her because that's what she'll be one day.
Last April just before my birthday Choo once again came home with a bike...for me...2001 HD Sportster 1200 all silver and black.
Again I was pissed. For me it was an unnecessary purchase. I didn't know how to ride, no license...no interest. Yet anyway, I had committed to the BSA in you know like 5 years or something dumb like that but here in front of me was a fully functional motorcycle...oh...god. So with that came a sudden pressure as my bestie has her 91' Sportster and another close friend was in the process of building his. Choo was waiting for his Softtail to be delivered from Alberta, so here stood... mine.
And did she intimidate the hell out of me. I stood there for I don't even know how long trying to process that I now had a motorcycle and not just a motorcycle but a Harley Davidson bike, me who doesn't even own a car. I know that I put the pressure on myself every second I stood there looking at her.
"Well then..." I said. "It looks like it's you and me."
The second I said it I felt like the air had been sucked out of me. I had been around bikes, ridden on the back but never on my own so for me to even think about being in control of one, and a big one was terrifying but I accepted that I was just going to have to learn sooner than I had planned. Once that acceptance settled in the whispers started. I like to think it was the bike telling me that it was going to be ok, that we'd work together and get to know each other and build our relationship.
I probably just needed meds.
After that day all I thought about was riding but I had time because I couldn't transfer her over into my name until I had a license so with that I hit the books and studied. I looked over her backwards and forwards until I could identify all of the controls and the parts I needed to and what they did. I would imagine myself going through the motions that would be needed to operate the bike. My brother in law would give me tips and talk to me about tipping points, friction zones and pointers on what I might expect. He'd make me straddle the bike and gently sway her back and forth so I could accustom myself to her weight and balance. Things I could investigate and research before I even turned the key because that's what I do.
Just a brother helping a sister out and he never did it in an overbearing way. Sure he'd pick on me and ask me to get on it so we could go to Tim Horton's but he took all of my questions seriously and all of the riders I knew did the same but I wouldn't start the bike until I had my learners license and that was my own choice.
I finally went to go write the test and here you have to have a drivers license in order to get your motorcycle license so I had to write 2 tests one after the other and passed them both after serious anxiety over the motorcycle test. You had never seen a happier girl.
Taking a course had been thrown at me on more than one occasion in conversation even now but I'm one of those people that lives pay cheque to pay cheque and I simply can't afford to take it having a family of 6. I've been self taught my whole life. I taught myself how to ride a bicycle, skateboard, ice skate ect...now I'm not dumb enough to think I could do this without instruction, that I had from multiple sources and the Internet is wonderful on the theory aspect. Don't get me wrong though, I could have taken the course which I should have back then but in all honesty I was scared to be put in a situation with other people that could observe my possible failure because my brain went there telling me I couldn't do it.
Stupid I know so if you ever have the option...Take the course.
Over the past year so much has changed in the way I see riding and how I'm finding the "Me" in it all and wanting to be around other women riders and submerged in the culture.
As I go along I will include Information sources on all sorts of stuff including my completions and failures. Is that pessimistic or realistic?
I guess we'll find out because this is a life altering journey for me and I'm more than happy to share the experience.
So concludes this Motor Monday.
See Ya!
S
