dimanche 12 octobre 2014

#4 Harley Incident

So today is thanksgiving. I’m not going to write about all the things I am thankful for because I would end up with a few blisters on my fingers. I say fingers because my left thumb is immobilized to prevent my wrist from moving. I wasn’t going to write about that either but now that I’m on the topic I guess I have to in order to keep the incredibly huge amount of followers excited.

2 weeks ago, I was having a not so great day at work. The weather was nice out and I decided to go for a motorcycle ride since I had a hunch it would most likely be the last chance I would have this season due to weather and work. And how right was I… The only different detail here is the reason why it was in fact my last ride of the season.

After boosting the bike with my car battery (The alarm system on it drains the battery after a few weeks of not being ridden), I quickly changed out of my work uniform and went for what I thought would be a great ride. Right before hopping on the bike and leaving, I decided to wear my padded jacket for the first time of the summer as I thought I would be comfortable due to the nice little breeze. I then strapped on my bobber helmet, Oakley sunglasses and face scarf. I then proceeded to go for my usual drive and not even five minutes away from home, that’s when it happened.

My head was in the clouds as I was thinking about what I could have done differently during the day in order to minimize collateral damage at work. I was moving at 60kmh (in a 70kmh zone) and noticed a bright red sign that was screaming STOP at me as I noticed it a little later than I normally would of. Unfortunately, I had not noticed the constellation of little rocks that were leading up to the stop. Needing to be a little more aggressive with the breaks as usual in order to make the stop, the front wheel locked and that made it so I was finding myself on a trajectory towards the ground.

My first reaction was to tell myself in a very calm manner ‘’bon’’. Which is a French expression for ‘’here we go’’…or something like it. Suddenly, everything was in slow motion, just like in the movies. As I was falling towards my left side, I made sure to lift my leg high enough so it would not get caught beneath the bike and get crushed. So far so good. I had enough time to look at the ground and twist my body so I wouldn’t land straight on my shoulder and break my collarbone. Check. From this point on, I put my hands out so my face would not smash on the ground and I could not do anything more but wait until this was all over, hoping to have minimised the damage as much as possible. My hands did not stay on the ground very long as the rest of my body followed and my jacket absorbed most of the impact. I went into a short slide and started rolling. At this point the only thing I could do is concentrate on the motion of my body and try not to let my head hit the ground.

After I was done rolling, I saw my bike pass me while it was sliding on its side. It eventually came to a stop. By instinct, I got up and told myself I had to get out of traffic as soon as possible. I walked quickly to my bike, which was about 5 meters away from me, pushed it up on its wheels, and tried to roll it to the side of the road. While I was trying to shift it in neutral so I could bring it to the side of the road, I heard a girl asking me with a very traumatized voice if I was ok. I turned around and there she was just sitting there and waiting to see what my answer would be…I told her I was fine and off she went. At this point I could not understand how a person could just drive off and not physically get out of his or her car to check on a person that just flew off of his bike at 60kmh. After she drove off, I heard it again…this time it was another girl in a different car. Same story and off she went. I was finally able to put my bike in neutral gear. I watched the car roll away as I was moving my bike towards the side of the road…and to my surprise, another car rolled by holding his horn down as aggressive as possible (like I was staying in the middle of the road on purpose). From that moment on, I felt very blessed for this province’s drivers’ mentality and manners (BIG sarcasm).

I was on the side of the road and a little shook up. I checked myself quickly to make sure I had no broken bones or critical injuries. Other than feeling the adrenaline, I seemed fine for the moment. Then, the bike wouldn’t start. I got my phone out and tried to call someone. I do not remember whom, but all three calls would not answer. After trying to start the bike one more time before calling a towing, it started. I put my gear back on and headed home. While I was driving back home, I could tell that my knee was bleeding as it kept sticking to my jeans. At about two minutes in the ride back home, both my wrists started to hurt more and more. I finally got home, parked the bike, got in the house and cleaned the scrapes I had. I finally got in contact with my wife to let her know I was ok. As she was on her way home from work, she got there in no time.

After about an hour, I could not move my left wrist and my right wrist was doing pretty bad also. I decided it might be a good idea to go get checked at the ER. I will not go into details on how bad of a job the doctors did but, I can resume it to: The one and only thing they checked was my left wrist and they put a temporary cast on it (a half cast) and told me they would call within a week to tell me the results. It has now been almost three weeks and no news yet. When I called, the answer was: ‘‘the file is still in transfer and it will be another three weeks before we have the results’’.

For those who are wondering, the bike is fine as it has crash bars on it, which are designed to protect the bike in these circumstances. Also, I got checked at another hospital the upcoming Monday in case there was actually internal damage or something that the other ER missed. Turns out, my bike and I are very lucky in the outcome of all of this.

Finally, the reason I was writing today was to talk about my first half marathon experience…I guess I got carried away with my cast. I will leave that story for my next Blog as this one seems to be long enough for today.

Cheers and until next time.


Frank

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