May 27, 2022
I don't know if I want to go.
Road Africa.
I mean, OF COURSE, I want to go. It's my thing. Or it was. Loud bikes, dusty trails, a backpack full of beer and a lime if you're fucking fancy. It was always hot and then, when it wasn't, it would rain with popcorn hail. It's own little weather system and you tucked in under an awning with soaked jeans and shoes.
I don't camp anymore, but I'd still like to go. I hate cold showers, but I'd like to suffer like that again. Not as cool as when you could peruse the pits but nothing stays fun forever, right?
I remember the year after the first one. The shop road up to the races together. I was on a yellow Super Chicken that was jetted for shit. Steve?? or someone traded it in on a VTX. It was that freakin' color changing purple that I shined to perfection and when I pulled the side cover off to get at his owner's manual for the PDI, I dropped the cover and listened to it TING, TING, TING, TING down the slope of the service hill to the sidewalk. Wall of Shame, yo. That thing cost some cash.
But back to the main picture...
He put his hat on backwards and took off on his pit bike, giving me an almost glance and I just died not being able to run amok with him. Too fast, too drunk, too fun and he knew all the good spots. The hill where you could see the most curves, the little nooks and crannys where almost famous people hung out, the pits where fame dripped with the easy flow of beer.
Fuck Brad Pitt. I could probably high five the guy and shrug him away. Give me Miguel Duhamel, Jake Zemke, The Worm, the Hayden and Bostrom brothers and my tongue was tied. They could bench race with the most humble of them but I didn't race on benches or otherwise so I just listened with an escalated heart rate.
Shenaniganza at night, race gas in the morning, and I don't know if I ever ate a better burger than they used to make...
I don't know.
If I should go.
But I want to.