You can call this one a tale of determination, or maybe just
teenage hormones. I was sixteen, and my parents and my buddy
Terry's parents were out for the night. Terry tells me he has set up a double date for us with two girls that lived 20
miles away. Now this is in Wisconsin, in Febuary, but we had a slight warming spell, and it had gotten all the way up to zero. Well, Pop took the keys to the rental car with him (no flies on him) and a friend who was willing to be a taxi blew his car up on the way over. In the garage, however, was a Honda CB125S.
Terry's description of the girls had made up my mind and soon we were on the road, each wearing about a foot of closet. After about 10 miles, the cold had seeped through all 3 pairs of my jeans and my long johns as well, but there
were girls at the end of the ride, so we kept on. Then coming over a snowy hill, the back tire blew. At about 50mph. The next 10 seconds were probably the best job of riding I've ever done. Or the luckiest, I don't know, but I kept it out of the snowdrift. I turned to Terry and said, "I don't think we're meant to see these girls." It was a nice laugh, but we were stuck in Boondock,WI with a flat. An old 'Street and Trail Rider' article came to the rescue and we stuffed weeds inside the tire to give it some shape and limp home. It worked all right, 15mph, the back end shaking from one side to the other, me with a death-grip
on the bars. When we got home, Terry had to pry my hands off
the grips, I couldn't let go. Looking back almost 3 decades later I have to say- hell yes, I'd do it again.
