Sunday, November 11, 2007
Chicks on bikes
There are two types of women on motorcycles, riders and passengers. In my opinion, it takes more courage to be a passenger, but it's always better to be the rider. Passengers are, by definition, along for the ride. They are effectively without any control of what is going on around them, which means they are literally trusting the rider with their lives. That type of vulnerability is completely foreign to my way of thinking. I have a hard enough time riding along with someone in a car, being on the back of a bike would be an experience not unlike having my teeth pulled.
Passengers have guts, particularly passengers straddling the tail section of a sportbike. Two modified Hayabusas pulled up next to me at a light on the way home tonight. Both bikes were two-up, and both passengers were very petite girls. On almost any bike, the passenger sits a bit higher than the rider, and the 'Busa's passenger seat is typical in this regard. However, most cruisers provide a bit more butt and legroom than your average sportbike. The two unfortunate ladies I saw tonight were perched precariously on the minimal passenger space available to them in what were effectively fetal positions. Not the way I want to travel around on two wheels.
I ride pretty regularly these days, but the only explanation I can come up with for putting yourself in such a vulnerable, uncomfortable position on bikes capable of reaching 190+mph is insanity. That is the best I can come up with, because any girl who would trust her life to a rider with a mohawk attached to his helmet, a stretched swingarm, and a nearly 200bhp motorcycle has to be out of her mind! lol
Female riders, on the other hand, are a different breed altogether. For reasons I do not understand, most women seem to be content as passengers. Maybe they are afraid of learning the controls, or perhaps they are simply happier on the back seat, whatever the reason, a majority of women give over control of the motorcycle to others. But once in a while, a woman decides that she would rather be clutching, throttling, and leaning a bike for herself. The effect is powerful. Getting off the backseat is a statement of self. Instead of deferring your safety, and a significant portion of the motorcycling experience, to another, you take the handlebars in your hands and assume the responsibility of piloting your journey. In that way, motorcycling makes for a wonderful life metaphor. And in life, there is no one more powerful and free than those with the courage to grab hold and set their own direction.
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Labels: life, motorcycles
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