The Roadmaster

This bike’s been parked for weeks out front of the Mill Valley Rec Center, where I used to work-out, and where I still shower when I’m not at Joan’s or feeling badass enough to cold shower aboard Scruffy because I’m too lazy to hook up my hot water heater….

This bike doesn’t move.

Me, I haven’t moved much either, lately.

Could be I’m falling apart at the seams.

Really?

Yeah…I feel that way.

One reason I feel that way is because I haven’t been working out. I don’t know why I haven’t been working out. I fell off the wagon, so to speak. I got distracted with shit. With life. Life got in the way.

I just lost the urge…

This is not good.

As an Old Fart, I figure I need to exercise everyday or I’ll rust like the Tin Man. I’ll seize-up. The old ticker will stall out. Squeeze itself like a fist. Do whatever it does when it BETRAYS YOU…

That’s right. YOUR HEART BETRAYS YOU!

Like a woman does. A woman will dump your ass cold. Betray you like it’s no big deal. Leave you for dead. Like you’re nothing. She don’t care. You are nothing…

It happened to me a couple times.

I’m not too proud to admit it. It happened to me.

I missed my cue and got dumped.

I usually get the jump on them. I dump them before they wise up and dump me.

But I’ll admit it happened to me a couple times.

And that’s okay.

I figure everybody plays the fool, sometime or other…

WTF? Why are you talking about women? Will you please get back to the road master!

Yeah, okay. So far I’m still alive…I’m sitting here, typing.

But the bike does not move.

Nobody gives a shit about this Bike.

This Bike may hold it’s position for eternity…or until a really mean-ass storm blows it over.

Why does nobody give a shit about this bike?

Why has it been propped up here for days and weeks?

Well, one reason is evident.

This Bike is by all appearance a real hard bike to ride.

I would not attempt to ride this bike. Even though riding a bike at my age is still easy as riding a bike. Until you fall over…fall over at seventy years old and break your god damned hip. And naturally it doesn’t heal. It festers and you swell like a steroid chicken and you’re brain synapses backfire and you stroke out and they dump you in a rest home where nurse Ratchet sticks you with the janitor’s supplies and you’re moaning with the ammonia…and then they do a lobotomy on your ass.

And that’s it man, you are cold burnt toast. Happens all the time.

Old farts need to stop riding bikes…stop climbing mountains…stop jumping out of airplanes. Or if you insist on jumping out of a airplane do it without a parachute and save your next of kin some misery…

I’m not going in any fucking rest home with this woman! You aint getting me, nurse Ratchet.

Back to the Bike

The roadmaster is hard to ride because…well, because there’s no seat. A hotshot punk don’t need a seat. A hotshot can ride without a seat. A seat is an unnecessary convenience to a juvenile delinquent. I know, I used to be one.

Another thing, if you didn’t already notice, this bike has a bent wheel. A bent wheel will make it impossible for anybody but a clown to ride this bike….

Clowns ride bikes with bent wheels all the time. Or they ride itty bitty bikes…

They can ride anything.

That’s why they’re clowns.

The Roadmaster needs a clown

It’s just sitting there, this bike. Propped up against the bike rack. Lonely as hell.

I’m not lonely. I got a girlfriend. She’s a Trumpie but nobody’s perfect. That’s the way I look at it these days. Nobody’s perfect. My girlfriend has many fine qualities and though some would shun her for being a Trumpie, I won’t. I won’t because I figure we’re all Americans. We’re all in this together and we should stick together. If she was a Nazi or a Klan member I might judge. There are Trumpies who exhibit fascists proclivities…

Marjorie Taylor Greene

Maybe all Trumpies exhibit Fascist proclivities. But not my girlfriend. Well, I don’t think she does. Maybe she does. At least she’s not with the Klan. I’ll need to check her purse, see if she’s a card carrier….

Besides, if I left her for being a member of the Klan, I’d be real lonely.

I’d be like the Roadmaster.

And to be perfectly frank, I just don’t want to be lonely!

So, as long as she keeps it to herself she’s a Nazi, and salutes the Fuhrer’s portrait in the privacy of her own room, I figure I’ll stick with her.

Because, after all, we’re in this together, so to speak.

Unless we’re British.

Writing is a hard bike to ride

The Roadmaster reminds me of my writing.

I’ve been stuck lately.

My writing has definitely been stuck. That’s the thing about writing…it’s not easy. You think it is. You think it’s like riding a bike. Easy Peasy. Easy as talking. But shit happens and you get stuck. You get in a space where you can’t write. You write a post that’s real bad. So you don’t write for a day or two. Or you get distracted by your life situation. A few days go by. A week. Before you know it three weeks go by.

Maybe you don’t write because you’re dealing with your seagull…

…or something more important.

Something life changing.

Like you’re thinking about selling your boat and moving into a R.V…

Comparatively speaking, this would be an upgrade.

Maybe I’ll shoot for something more modest.

Something closer to the earth, say:

The point I’m trying to make here….

LIfe gets in the way of your writing life. You get distracted.

By Life…

Writing is a hard bike to ride.

It’s easy to leave it alone. And once you leave it for a day or two…time slips away.

And before you know it…

Writing is like working out

You do it every day. Otherwise you get stiff. I need to get back into the routine.

Work out in the gym every day.

Write every day.

Or…. just give up.

Forget about it.

Find a bar and drink.

Or…drink on the job!

That’s the ticket. Drink on the job!

I’m a Brand Ambassador! The Booze is Free. I get paid to drink!

This is the perfect world.

Or if I prefer not to drink. Because I’m a coward. I could become a dog like that japanese dude did.

Toco in his collie suit.

Or…if I’m too cowardly to Drink myself to death…or become a dog…I suppose I could simply flush myself.

Snap out of it!

I’m done griping in public.

At least I’m back writing again.

This is important.

Is it?

Yeah, I guess so.

Maybe not.

Maybe this post is really all about me dicking around playing my favorite Soul Train music from the seventies!

Yeah, I think so.