Sitting on the Back of Your Red Kawasaki

A memoir in lyrics

I never fancied myself the motorcycle-riding type. Not even, or perhaps not especially, riding on the back of someone else’s bike.

I never fancied myself the bad boy type either. But this bad boy had a way of helping me embrace conditioned taboos, like psychedelics, and tattoos, and challenging the status quo, eventually helping me find the sacred in them.

How I resisted his advances, despite the twinkle in his eyes and that engaging smile. I say it was all me, having come out of a long and turbulent marriage. But, let’s be honest, it was him too — his beard, his cigarettes, his unconventional way of approaching….well…just about everything.

And then I got on his bike, and everything changed. I never felt so safe in my life.

The Song of Our Life

On our third date, at triple-digit speeds, I wrote a song* inside my helmet, only my second time on his red Kawasaki 1000.

Sittin’ on the back of your red Kawasaki, with my arms wrapped around you, hands in your pockets let’s ride… across the countryside.

To the dismay of my parents, and the chagrin of my daughters, I rode with him every chance I could. My father and stepmother thought it was foolish, given that I had children. My daughters thought Mom was cool, and that he wasn’t so bad, even if he wasn’t their dad.

My oldest even admitted to trying not to like him, but found it impossible. He was charming.

Holding on tight as you pick up speed. Thinking to myself, I’ve got all that I need, Right now. All that I need somehow.

Three dates, and I was falling harder, faster, in love, than I ever had before. All that I need right now? Seriously?

Slow down — — You barely know him. You’ve heard about rebound relationships, haven’t you? — — What about your daughters? And he has a daughter too? —

All these voices swirled in my head, my own and the assumptive voices of friends and family.

But my heart knew.

Straightening out the curves on the road ahead I don’t know where we’re going but it doesn’t really matter I guess.

And it didn’t matter. Except for a few misunderstood moments, he was showing me at every turn that he was completely serious about our fledgling relationship.

“I’m monogamous,” he said, wanting me to know the level of his commitment, as well as letting me know that he would prefer that I not “date around.”

I wasn’t the sexually promiscuous kind, so it wasn’t about that for me. But I had just come up for air following a seventeen-year marriage to a complete narcissist. And I didn’t want to just jump into another relationship. I imagined myself casually meeting more than a few men before I ended up in a kettle resembling the hot pot I had just managed to escape. I wanted options.

Committed

“I love you,” he said, one night when he stayed over. I don’t think we were even two weeks into our dating relationship. I couldn’t say it back, not yet, but I thought that I just might love him too.

I’m holdin’ on baby. Let’s kick it into gear. There’s no tellin’ where we’ll go from here. Let’s ride. Across the countryside.

Within three months, we began to look for a house together. He had already helped me move out of the apartment I had been living in with my ex, as I was already in arrears with the rent. Because of my daughters, he didn’t suggest that I move in with him, but found instead an inexpensive two-bedroom not far from him.

But, he had made room by that time in his closet for some of my clothes, and space in the medicine cabinet for my toothbrush and toiletries.

Open up the throttle, feel the wind rushing by As long as I’m with you, I’m feeling alright. It’s true. Nothin’ else I wanna do.

Within another few months, we moved out of the city. Up the hill and into the beautiful Sierra Nevada mountains. We bought a cute house that looked like a tree house, its three stories reaching high into the pine trees.

Straightening out the curves on the road ahead I don’t know where we’re going but it doesn’t really matter I guess.

It looked like we were settling down, but the words of that last line were prophetic. We truly had no idea where we were going.

Motorcycle Accident

Less than six weeks after we moved into that house, I received an early morning phone call, just as I was preparing my daughters for school.

He said he’d been hit, by a van. “I’m okay,” he told me. “Get the girls to school and come to the hospital. They’re taking me in, but there’s no need to rush.”

He was a skilled rider — I called him the Papa Bear of the sport bike riding group he often rode with. He was always looking out for inexperienced riders, even while he often led the pace on rides. If help was needed, he’d fall back immediately, making sure all riders were safe and accounted for.

He had been in commuter traffic, so he couldn’t have been going that fast. “Maybe it’s nothing more than scratches,” I thought, trying to calm my heart and mind while I made my way into the city.

Straightening out the curves, Talking to the wind, Flattening out the hills, Forgetting where we’ve been…. Straightening out the curves, Talking to the wind, Flattening out the hills, Forgetting where and when….

When I arrived at the hospital, I was shown to the Emergency Room trauma bay he was in. He put on a good face for me, as he informed me that he had two broken wrists, a broken thumb, two broken ribs, and some knee injuries that neither of us remembers now.

Following subsequent wrist reduction and casting, he would spend well over eight weeks in double casts. I fed him, held his cigarette to his lips, helped him shower and dress, and yes, even helped him use the bathroom.

Double Down

We weren’t married yet. He says he wonders why I stayed. This wasn’t exactly the romantic life we’d imagined.

Later, he would have surgery on his right wrist to remove the scaphoid bone, just short of fusing his wrist. Still, he lost 90% of his wrist flexion.

His motorcycle riding days were all but over. He would ride briefly for a few months once fully recovered but his limited mobility and lingering pain eventually convinced him to sell his precious bike.

I rode almost a mile with him on one of those last days, but a dip in the road was a little deeper than he thought when he put his foot down to steady the bike, and the bike tipped, throwing me off. While this gave us pause, we didn’t want to end it all on this note.

We took one last ride together, for old time’s sake, singing the song of our life together.

Since then, life has given us more than a few curves to straighten out, but I can proudly say, as we celebrate ten years of marriage, I’ve got all that I need right now, All that I need somehow.

Song: “Straightening Out the Curves” © 2013 Michele Jennae (Battershell) aka Runa Heilung

*That day, as I rode on the back of his bike, I remembered watching the cartoons with Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner. Road Runner ran so fast down the curved roads that they straightened out, hence “Straightening Out the Curves.”

Runa Heilung is an Old Soul Alchemist, mystic, and dream archaeologist. She works with dreams, oracles, and the imagination to help people rediscover their Inner Wisdom.