HinesSight

USA Today story about older motorcycle riders mentions...ME!

Here's what I found most interesting in a USA Today story by Kim Painter, "Older motorcycle riders more likely to get badly hurt" -- the parts that mentioned me.

Brian Hines, 64, a writer from Salem, Ore., rode a motorcycle as a younger man, but when he wanted to return to two-wheeled riding in 2009, he took some extra safety steps: He got a motorized scooter instead of a full-sized bike, repeated an optional safety course, bought a highly-visible white helmet and avoided riding at night or in the rain.

His precautions paid off and he never had an accident, Hines says.

...As for Hines, he did sell his scooter in 2012 – something he says greatly pleases his wife. "She was worried every time I took off." He says he likes a little risk in his life, "but there are ways to fill that need without risking life and limb." He's taken up skateboarding instead.

The rest of the story is worth reading also. Basic message: older riders need to recognize the increased risks they face because of poorer reaction times, decreased visual acuity, and such.

Reporter Kim contacted me after reading a blog post that I'd written after I'd started riding my Suzuki Burgman 650 maxi-scooter, "Older motorcycle riders, don't be scared by statistics." She thought that I made a lot of sense. 

Which, of course, I did. 

Davis talks about how the risks of motorcycling can be reduced markedly by going against the grain of what gets riders injured or dead.

That's why I have a white scooter, wear a white full face helmet, always wear complete protective gear, have green day-glo striping on my jacket, drive a scooter with antilock brakes, rarely drive at night or in the rain, don't speed or take turns too fast, don't ride after drinking alcohol, and -- vitally important -- retook the Team Oregon training class before I started my scootering.

I'm taking the same minimize-risks approach with skateboarding (actually, longboarding, but I can't blame Kim for using the more generic understandable term). I believe in living life crazily, on or off a four-wheeled board.

However, there is no contradiction between (1) taking risks which other people will view as "crazy," and (2) lessening those risks as much as possible. After all, getting hurt from a preventable accident often is better termed stupid than crazy. 

So I've continued to wear full protective gear almost 100% of the time when I'm on my longboard. With my big scooter, I never broke that rule. But since a longboard is quite a bit less dangerous than a motorcycle or scooter, occasionally I hop on one of my boards without a helmet or gloves on.

But rarely. I know that at 64, I don't heal nearly as fast as I did at 14, or 24. Older motorcyclists need to keep that in mind also. Be crazy and have fun. While being as safe as possible.

Why biking and other risky activities are dangerous, but not fearful

Thank you, Tim Krieder, for writing such a marvelous New York Times essay, "Cycle of Fear." You wonderfully described why I love riding my maxi-scooter (a Suzuki Burgman 650) so much. Also, why I like boogie boarding on the biggest waves I can find on a Hawaii vacation so much.

Krieder talks about riding his bicycle in New York City. But his explanation of why risky activities are so enjoyable applies to lots of pursuits: motorcycling, downhill skiing, rock climbing, skateboarding, horse riding, many others.

After speaking about our modern-day hypervigilance to mostly imaginary threats, the worries and anxieties of everyday life that obsess our waking brains (and even our dreams), Krieder says:

Which is why it’s such a relief, an exhilarating joy, to break the clammy paralysis of worry and place yourself at last in real physical danger. Even though it’s the time when I am at most immediate risk, riding my bike in Manhattan traffic is also one of the only times when I am never anxious or afraid — not even when a cab door swings open right in front of me, some bluetoothed doofus strides into my path, or a dump truck’s fender drifts within an inch of my leg.

At those moments fear is a low neurological priority that would only interfere with my reaction time, like a panicky manager shoved aside by competent, grim-faced engineers in a crisis. I doubt that the victims of sudden violent accidents die terrified; they’re probably extremely alert, brains gone pretty much blank while their galvanized bodies try to figure out what to do. I don’t think our minds are designed to accept that there’s no way out. Based on my own close calls, I suspect that if I am killed while biking, the state of mind in which I am likeliest to die is extreme annoyance. And at least it won’t be by drowning.

Exactly. I'm never scared while riding my powerful scooter.

(I usually put some sort of macho adjective before "scooter" when I write about my passion, to differentiate a Suzuki Burgman 650 from weenie scooters like teeny Vespas; nothing wrong with them, where I live it just seems like they're almost always ridden by young women wearing pink helmets, a demographic I don't identify with.)

As Krieder says, there's too much that needs concentrating on while engaged in a risky activity for fear to be present in one's mind. Even when riskiness raises its dangerous head, dealing with the situation occupies the brain cells which otherwise might scream Scary!

When I’m balanced on two thin wheels at 30 miles an hour, gauging distance, adjusting course, making hundreds of unconscious calculations every second, that idiot chatterbox in my head is kept too busy to get a word in. I’ve heard people say the same thing about rock-climbing: how it shrinks your universe to the half-inch of rock surface immediately in front of you, this crevice, that toehold.

Biking is split-second fast and rock-climbing painstakingly slow, but both practices silence the noise of the mind and render self-consciousness blissfully impossible. You become the anonymous hero of that old story, Man versus the Universe. Your brain’s glad to finally have areal job to do, instead of all that trivial busywork. You are all action, no deliberation. You are forced, under pain of death, to quit all that silly ideation and pay attention. It’s meditation at gunpoint.

Right now my stomach muscles are sore.

This morning the waves were running nicely high in Maui's Napili Bay. However, they weren't breaking super-cleanly, gradually from side to side. More like crashing down vertically in a single curvaceous whump, then whitewatering onwards.

It took a while to figure out where to position me and my boogie board for optimum wave-catching. I decided to venture past a small reef, rather than wait for a wave in front of it. This was a good decision. But for a split second, I had some doubt.

Not a fearful doubt. Just a calm, albeit highly focused, feeling of Whoa...look at this.

What I was looking at was nothing. Nothing, that is, between me and the ocean some four feet or so below, as the breaking wave had caught me in the curl and presented me with a great view of empty air between me and the ocean (also, somewhere, rocks). 

I managed to hold onto the sides of my boogie board and land halfway gracefully on the wave after falling what seemed like miles. The landing hurt, but any discomfort was quickly erased from my mind as I enjoyed my best wave run of the day, almost all the way into the beach.

So, yes, I know what Krieder is talking about. And heartily agree with it.

I’m convinced these are the conditions in which we evolved to thrive: under moderate threat of death at all times, brain and body fully integrated, senses on high alert, completely engaged with our environment. It is, if not how we’re happiest — we’re probably happiest in a hot tub with a martini and a very good naked friend — how we are most fully and electrically alive. Of course we can’t sustain this state of mind for too long.

People who go through their whole lives operating on impulse tend to end up in jail. We are no longer purely animals, living only in the moment; we are the creatures who live in time, as salamanders live in fire, prisoners of memory and imagination, tortured with dread and regret. That other, extra-temporal perspective is not the whole reality of our condition. It’s more like the view from the top of the Empire State Building, of people as infinitesimal dots circulating ceaselessly through a grid.

Eventually we have to descend back to street level, rejoin the milling mass and take up our lives; you lock up your bike and become hostage to the hours again. But it’s at those moments that I become briefly conscious of what I actually am — a fleeting entity stripped of ego and history in an evanescent present, like a man running in frames of celluloid, his consciousness flickering from one instant to the next.

Photos of "The Mild One" with my Burgman 650 scooter

You can sort of see the resemblance.

If you're near-sighted. Squint real hard. Use your imagination. Isn't it obvious... how Marlon Brando and me are so similar, posing with our "bikes"?

The Wild One.

The Mild One.

Maybe I would have looked more Brando'ish if Jim, a friend, hadn't taken my photo in the parking lot adjacent to the West Salem Starbucks, the wild mild scene of our Sunday morning caffeine-fueled get-together.

But adding a helmet, dark glasses, and a jaunty wave adds to my macho cool'ness, in my decidedly nonobjective opinion. Also, obscuring my facial features makes me look a lot more like Marlon Brando, wouldn't you say?

(For real cool, the Corvette in the background beats me out, big-time.)

2009 Suzuki Burgman 650 Exec for sale in Salem, Oregon

[Sorry, no longer for sale.]

Spring is almost here -- in western Oregon, at least. Our bulbs are blooming, and it's going to hurt when I can't ride my much beloved 2009 Suzuki Burgman 650 Exec scooter during warm weather this year. But I've got to sell this beauty. (click on photos for larger images)

So says my wife.

If it was up to me, I'd keep the Burgman after my recently-ordered 2011 Mini Cooper S makes its way from England to our carport. However, my wife has put a limit on the number of "boy toys" I can keep in our cramped garage, so the scooter has to, well, scoot.

I've always wanted a Mini Cooper, so now that I'm 62 and on the Social Security gravy train, I decided to fulfill my dream. The Burgman has been a lot of fun, a lot, bringing a smile each and every time I ride it. Whoever buys it will both get a great deal, and loads of two-wheeled enjoyment.

Some particulars: about 3800 miles on it at the moment; never had a problem with it; the scooter has never been laid down or in an accident; it's had all scheduled maintenance. And there's pluses...

l've got an XL Clearview shield on the Burgman, as I wanted less wind noise/buffeting (the screen is clear and has a vent). However, I still have the stock shield, on the left in the photo above, and a Large Clearview (tinted and with a vent) that I used for a while until I decided an XL was better for my six-foot body.

The two Clearview screens cost about $280 each. I'm including them in the asking price. Which, since I can hear you asking, is $7,500. 

The Burgman is in almost perfect condition. I researched prices for 2009 Execs via a NADA Guides search and found the average retail price was $7,428. For $7,500  I'm throwing in two additional screens that cost $560, along with a $135 Airhawk seat cushion (air-filled; makes for a much more comfortable ride).

Plus, there's a year left on a three-year maintenance agreement that I purchased with the Burgman when I bought it from Cycle Country here in Salem.

I was told that the next service (due in June, I believe) is the most expensive. The agreement is transferable to the new owner, so that's a significant additional value included in the $7,500. If the new owner doesn't live near Salem, it might be possible for me to have the final service done before the scooter is handed off.

My email address is [email protected]  Contact me if you're interested in the 2009 Suzuki Burgman Exec, including your phone number. Assume that it is still for sale unless you see a big red SOLD at the beginning of this post.

If you aren't familiar with how great these scooters are, do some research and likely it won't take long before you get an itch to buy a Burgman.

Some advice, because I want the buyer to be happy with my scooter: it's a 650, not a cute little Vespa. It'll go over 100 mph. It's heavy, so a small woman might find it too daunting. The Burgman 650 has been described as a motorcycle disguised as a scooter, which is pretty accurate. It's faster than a lot of motorcycles, yet without the noise, vibration, and need to shift gears.

And the Burgman 650 Exec has anti-lock brakes, a huge plus.

To stop, I just squeeze on both hand levers as hard as I want with no danger of unsettling the "bike," as is the case with a motorcycle or scooter that doesn't have anti-lock.
 
To go, I just turn the throttle on the right handlebar. No shifting, ever -- unless you want to (the Burgman can be shifted manually via buttons, but I've never had a reason to do this, other than to play around with the feature a few times.)

The underseat storage is great. I can easily store my helmet and jacket, plus gloves and dark glasses, when I make a stop. No need to carry all your gear around in stores, or wherever. I've found that I can even cram my helmet, protective jacket/pants/gloves, and boots under the seat. So I can head off in shorts and sandals during the summer, then come back and gear up without needing to carry anything around.

This is the instrument panel, showing the mileage as of today. I like the high-tech look. If you want a retro, chromed-up bike that can be heard coming from blocks away, get a Harley. But if you want super-fun, reliable, safe, stylish, 44 mpg transportation, get a Suzuki Burgman.

Hey, I've got one for sale. $7,500. Contact me: [email protected]

Here's a few additional photos. (No, the dog doesn't come with the scooter.)

 

Older motorcycle riders, don't be scared by statistics

Uh, oh -- that was my reaction when I went to get The Oregonian newspaper last Tuesday. Prominently displayed on the front page (if I recall correctly) was a headline about older motorcycle riders getting into more accidents.

Since my wife isn't wild about my Suzuki Burgman 650 scooter obsession, arguing that it's too dangerous to ride around on fewer than four motorized wheels, I figured that Laurel wouldn't make a distinction between "motorcycle" and "scooter" when she read the story.

I was right. But to my wife's credit, the only reference she ended up making to it was, "I hope you read about older guys getting into accidents."

My response: "Yes, I did. It was interesting. But I didn't learn anything new."

I already was aware that the average age of motorcyclists is increasing, as baby boomers rekindle their love affairs with this marvelously enjoyable means of transportation, and that older riders are more likely to be injured or die in an accident.

But...

I stand by my blog post of last year, written shortly before I picked up my Burgman: "Motorcycling is as dangerous as you make it."

Before deciding to get back into riding, I studied motorcycling accident statistics (didn't come across scooter-specific data, which probably are mixed in with motorcycles).

They can be pretty sobering and scary.

Motorcyclists were 35 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in a crash per vehicle mile traveled in 2006 and eight times more likely to be injured, according to NHTSA.

Here's the thing, though. Those figures are on average.

They include motorcyclists driving drunk or stoned, not wearing a helmet, speeding like crazy, lacking protective gear, unlicensed to drive a motorcycle, those who haven't taken a motorcycle safety course, and such.

Nobody wants to be average. Especially when it comes to staying alive and healthy.

So the most informative (and inspiring) web site I came across in my motorcycle accident statistic research was this one: an article by James R. Davis called "Beating the Odds Requires that You Act ABNORMALLY."

Davis talks about how the risks of motorcycling can be reduced markedly by going against the grain of what gets riders injured or dead.

That's why I have a white scooter, wear a white full face helmet, always wear complete protective gear, have green day-glo striping on my jacket, drive a scooter with antilock brakes, rarely drive at night or in the rain, don't speed or take turns too fast, don't ride after drinking alcohol, and -- vitally important -- retook the Team Oregon training class before I started my scootering.

Reading the Oregonian story, I didn't find any facts that made me scared to be riding regularly at my increasingly ripe age (I'll soon be 62). For example:

As ridership took off, so did the number of fatal crashes, shooting from 29 in 2002 to 51 last year. Crashes spiked from 337 in 2002 to 842. Up to a third were not licensed to drive a motorcycle. But in nearly half, no other vehicle was involved, says Michele O'Leary, ODOT's motorcycle safety program manager. The rider just made a mistake.

The Oregonian examined the crash reports and interviewed the investigating officers of the 33 deaths so far this year, and found a startling number could have been avoided. Running red lights, rear-ending and colliding with cars claimed several lives.

But more than half of the riders died after they left the roadway or missed a curve on a clear, dry road. Several suffered horrifying injuries usually after striking a tree, roadside sign, utility pole or boulder.

Thus the risk of riding a motorcycle or scooter can be reduced by about 50% just by not being stupid, inattentive, or figuring that your handling skills are better than they really are.

Doing the sorts of common-sense risk-reduction things I mentioned above cuts down on the chance of gettting in an accident even further. However, no matter how careful a rider is, there's no getting around the fact that driving on two wheels is going to be more dangerous than getting around in a four-wheeled "cage" (as motorcyclists like to refer to cars).

Also, a lot more fun.

Which is why I ride, along with most motorcyclists and scooterers -- aside from those who can't afford a car and simply need a low cost means of transportation.

Back when I worked in health planning and policy research I became acquainted with the notion of balancing the quality and quantity of life. This often comes into play with living wills, where a person has to indicate how he or she feels about this sort of tradeoff.

Most people consider that extending the sheer quantity of life via time spent hooked up to a respirator, feeding tube, and such isn't worth the suffering and distress if one's quality of life is dirt-poor.

Similarly, virtually everybody is willing to take some risks in order to get more enjoyment out of life. Whether it is horseback riding, bicycling, getting on an airplane, or even driving to the weekly meeting of a knitting circle, doing something rewarding entails some risk-taking.

Today a guy came up to me as I was preparing to get on my scooter after having coffee with friends at the West Salem Starbucks. He said that he was thinking of getting a Burgman 650 and wanted to know how I liked it.

"I love it," I told him.

And proceeded to tell him more than he perhaps wanted to know about my replacement windscreen, a recently purchased seat cushion that makes my butt happier, how I'm able to store all of my riding gear under the seat, the joy of anti-lock brakes and automatic shifting, etc. etc.

My core message, though, was how riding this maxi-scooter has put the fun back into driving around, just like when I first got my driver's license at 16.

Getting someplace is secondary to simply experiencing the joy of open-air riding -- being in touch with the scooter, the air temperature, sounds, sights, the texture of the road, other vehicles, everything that is less lively when encased in a car (even a convertible).

I told the guy that I can't believe I'd get more enjoyment from any other sort of $10,000 purchase. Even a $150,000 Maserati, I said, wouldn't be as much fun to drive as a $3,000 motorcyle, because there's no comparison between four and two wheels.

It sounded like he was on his way to becoming another Suzuki Burgman 650 happy rider. I hope so. Life is short. The risks of motorcycling and scootering are well worth the rewards, because most of the risk factors are within the rider's control.

So if you're older, like me, and thinking of getting a bike my advice is in tune with Nike's: "just do it."

Scooters more popular in Europe (sadly)

Some friends of ours, TIm and Jan, just got back from Europe. Today Tim, knowing of my scooter obsession, sent me a photo he took in Florence, Italy.

He said, "This picture was taken on a street that runs along the Arno river near the Uffizi museum and Ponte Vecchio."

Bellissimo!

I was in Florence for a few days back in my college days (1968). I don't remember seeing such a beautiful display of two-wheeled art. If I returned, I'd probably spend much of my time staring at scooters rather than other artistic treasures.

Tim and Jan said that scooters are much more common in Europe than here in the United States. I need to think about emigrating.

Today I rode my Burgman 650 into Salem for my Tai Chi class. I saw only three motorcycles on my 50 minute drive (one a police bike). No fellow scooterers. If I lived in Europe I'd have a lot of fellow two-wheeled travelers.

Including some semi-crazy ones.

Before I bought my Burgman I enjoyed watching a short You Tube video of a guy riding the same model into Vienna, not entirely sanely. I don't ride like this guy, but I can understand the attraction of zipping through traffic on picturesque narrow European streets.

Watch and imbibe the high-speed scooter spirit.

Scootering at 40 degrees. Loving it. Must be addicted.

Let's consider the evidence for a man (let's call him Brian, for lack of a less realistic name) being addicted to riding his oh-so-beloved Suzuki Burgman scooter.

It's December 5 in western Oregon. The temperature is forty degrees, and falling. He's sitting in a south Salem coffee house, enjoying a nonfat vanilla latte after riding eight rather frigid miles so he can use the French Press wi fi to blog about scootering in forty degree weather.

Makes perfect sense to me. (Of course, I'm he.)

I can't think of a better way to spend a sunny afternoon than riding my scooter. Cold, I'm learning, isn't much of a concern on a Burgman -- at least not compared to most motorized two-wheel transportation.

My extra large Clearview shield, a replacement for the unduly puny windscreen that came with my scooter, does a great job of keeping wind off of me. When I wear the liner that came with my terrific Olympia Motosports jacket, I'm perfectly comfortable at forty degrees and below.

OK, with one exception: my hands. They're most exposed to the wind chill. I've got winter gloves, and added a thin underglove recently. That helps, but I'm not going to be riding for hours in cold weather unless I went to heated gloves.

Riding twenty minutes to a nice warm coffee house, though -- that's definitely on my winter agenda.

Some motorcycle and scooter riders store their bikes during the cold months. I briefly considered that. Just as drug addicts or alcoholics briefly consider giving up their own addiction.

I'm hooked. It's just too damn much fun to get on my scooter and feel the freedom of motoring down the road, any road, without being in the cage of a car.

If you're a rider, you know what I mean. If you aren't, you probably won't. Addictions are like that. Until you've tasted the high, imbibing won't make sense to the unaddicted.

Tricking out my Suzuki Burgman 650 maxi-scooter

I was going to use "customizing" in the title of this post, but I like "tricking out" better. When a guy is riding a white Japanese scooter, he needs all the hip street vibe he can muster up.

In fact, I'm going a bit backwards on the cool front, since I just replaced the tinted Clearview replacement shield that I wrote about last month with a taller untinted model.

I've now got the XL Clearview shield for my Burgman 650 Executive, instead of a medium. That adds three inches in height. I decided that I was happy to trade being able to look over the shield for less wind buffeting, which was still noticeable with the medium shield.

When I lower the shield (the Executive adjusts the height by 2.5 inches with a button touch), I can just see over the top of the XL shield if I get my six foot body sitting up straight.

So if I ever encounter a cloud of locusts, sort of unlikely here in Oregon, I'll be able to keep scootering along.

The tint on my first Clearview was appealing on bright sunny days. But when I rode on an overcast day -- which come along now and then in the Northwest, if you didn't know that -- it seemed unduly darkening. Ditto with an evening ride.

Live and learn. I'll probably see if I can sell the medium tinted vented shield on Ebay (I stuck with the vent option, which works great to get more airflow onto me on hot days).

I'm up to about 1300 miles on my Burgman 650, which I got in June. I ride it every chance I can. Which has been a lot, given how nice the weather has been in western Oregon this summer. Major grocery shopping, getting bales of hay, and such can't be done on a scooter, but just about everything else is more fun on two wheels.

Except for crashing, of course. I haven't had a single problem so far in that regard, not even close.

A few days ago, though, we drove our car to Portland and came back a few hours after a bunch of  Brother Speed motorcycle club members had gotten into an accident in the northbound lanes just before Wilsonville. The southbound traffic we were in was backed up for miles, purely due to gawkers.

Best wishes to the injured for a full and complete recovery.

On the KGW news last night they had an interview with the leader of another motorcycle club. He said that he knew the Brother Speed riders would want to get back on their bikes as soon as possible, because riding gets in your blood.

For sure. Whether you're riding a high-tech white Suzuki Burgman scooter like me, or a bad-ass tricked out Harley like many of the Brother Speeder's do.

When I checked out their web site to get a URL link for this post, I noticed a video section. Pretty cool. There's something powerful and primal about dozens of motorcycles coming down the road.

I've joined the Oregon Scooter Club, but haven't gone on any group rides yet. Probably one day I'll be able to experience the (considerably quieter) scootering version of the Brother Speed videos.

Riding a scooter or motorcycle is good for your health

Now, so far the title of this blog post doesn't find much support on the Internet, judging from a comprehensive two-minute Google search that I just performed.

But I wanted to be one of the first -- heck, maybe the absolute first! -- to point out the undeniable health benefits of riding a scooter or motorcycle. By "undeniable," naturally I mean my personal opinion -- par for the course in the blogging world.

I will, however, back up that claim with some solid evidence from a trustworthy source, TIME magazine. Here's what I read in the August 17, 2009 issue, in an article about why exercise doesn't make you thin:

But there's some confusion about whether it is exercise -- sweaty, exhausting, hunger-producing bursts of activity done exclusively to benefit our health -- that leads to all these benefits or something simpler: regularly moving during our waking hours.

...Many obesity researchers now believe that frequent, low-level physical activity -- the kind humans did for tens of thousands of years before the leaf blower was invented -- may actually work better for us than the occasional bouts of exercise you get as a gym rat.

I've been enjoying the Suzuki Burgman 650 Executive scooter that I got last June much more than I thought I would. And I expected to enjoy it a lot.

Much of the appeal of scootering, as with motorcycling, is the increased physicality -- compared to getting around in a car.

Starting off, I need to rock the rather heavy Burgman off of its center stand. Then I push it backward out of its narrow carport parking area using my feet (no reverse gear). Motoring along, there's some pushing on the handlebars into and out of turns, plus movement of my upper body as the scooter leans.

Coming to a stop, I put my feet down, balancing the scooter while I'm at a standstill. Taking off again, the reverse. At low speeds, creeping along, it's a lot like balancing a bicycle -- adjusting my weight slightly this way and that to keep the scooter upright. Parking downtown, I pull past a space, then push the Burgman backwards while turning the handlebars until it's properly positioned against the curb.

All in all, quite a bit of physical activity, involving considerable acts of coordination. Certainly much more than when I'm driving a car.

Being an avid Tai Chi student, I recognize that much of what I'm doing on my scooter (not to be confused with this very different kind) is the sort of balancing and muscular movements that have been proven to be beneficial to seniors and younger people alike.

"Use it or lose it" is an especially important adage for those of us over 60. Sure, there are risks associated with riding a motorcycle or scooter. But there also are health benefits, not the least of which are mental.

As soon as I get on my Burgman 650, I feel happier. More relaxed. Centered. Focused on the here and now. In touch with nature. Energized.

Scooters and motorcycles aren't for everybody. I seem to have a scooter personality, because I've driven our cars as minimally as possible since I got the Burgman, only when I need to do some errands, like grocery shopping, that require me to carry around a large amount of stuff.

When the Oregon rain and cold hits, I'll probably return to driving a car most of the time. But to stay healthy, both mentally and physically, I'll get on my scooter as often as I can.

Here's an article about the accommodations some senior motorcycle riders need to make as they grow older. Motorcycles are less disability-friendly than scooters, given that you have to step over them to get on, and few have automatic transmissions, like scooters do.

I'll share an excerpt, that I agree with obviously, since I have a Suzuki Burgman (I think this was written some time ago, since much of what he forecasts has come to pass):

Have you seen the new large Honda and Suzuki Scooters? With automatic transmissions and easy highway speed, they can ride two up with maximum weather protection and little effort. Many of the older riders, especially those with physical limitations, such as a bad back, have been riding the Honda Helix, a 250cc automatic scooter that easily cruises at 65, sold in the U.S. since the mid-80's.

My look at the future shows a blending of the scooter and the motorcycle. Are you ready for a 100-hp scooter/cycle like Vetter's Defiant, with automatic transmission, very low seat height, low weight, and a big Harley engine? How about the Suzuki Burgman scooter with its 650cc twin cylinder engine, 5-speed push button automatic transmission, and over 100-mph top speed? Look at the new Honda FSC 600 Silverwing scooter; displacing 600 cc it will easily cruise with most motorcycles. Or Dan Gurney's scooter-like Alligator motorcycle with its lightweight and low seating position.

Put a Honda Goldwing (which is almost a scooter now) on a strict diet, reducing its weight to 500 pounds, add an optional automatic transmission, and you would have a perfect motorcycle/motor scooter. I don't know what to call it--a cyclescoot, a scootcycle?

I'm proud of my mid-life crisis

Being analytically-minded, before deciding on the title to this post I needed to figure out if "mid-life" defined my crisis, since I'm 60.

Ever since I got my Suzuki Burgman 650 Executive scooter, I've been pre-emptively telling people, "Yes, it's an end-of-life crisis purchase. The scooter is either going to bring a lot of joy to my increasingly aged life, or end it prematurely. Could be both, I suppose."

However, yesterday my wife said mid-life crisis when, in tidying up the house for a get-together this evening, she picked up an article about surfing on the Oregon coast that I'd torn out of the newspaper.

"What's this? You're not thinking of learning how to surf, are you?"
"Well, sure, it's something I've always wanted to do. Why not?"
"Sharks! Cold water! Undertows! Big waves! That's why! First the scooter, and now surfing. You're having a mid-life crisis!"

Laurel said that I should blog about it. I'm not sure why. Maybe she's hoping that the blogosphere will organize some sort of intervention for me.

Except, I don't feel in any need of one.

First, I can't be having that serious of a mid-life crisis if I meekly obey my wife's command to write a blog post about it. Second, I'm just about to pass out of the most common age range for a mid-life crisis, 40-60.

I guess when I turn sixty-one in a few months I'll officially be having an end-of-life crisis. Fine, bring it on.

I like to say, "Older people should be the ones riding motorcycles and scooters, because they have the fewest years left to live." Along that line, my wife also told me yesterday:

You've realized that you're getting closer to death, so you're running toward it.

Hmmmm. Interesting observation. Which is what I'd expect from a retired psychotherapist: a sort of counseling koan.

She may be right. But aren't we all getting closer to death? And a lot of wise sages have said that we should live every day as if it is our last, which sure sounds like advice to run toward death.

Anyway, the only thing I regret about my mid-life crisis, assuming I've having one, is that I didn't get into crisis mode much earlier in life. Yes, I readily admit that from my sixty-year-old vantage point, death appears closer than it did a decade or two ago.

Though I'm still in excellent health, with few medical complaints, I can see the aging handwriting on the wall of my body. Such as those damn age spots on my right hand, which is starting to bear a disturbing resemblance to how my grandmother's hands looked.

The time to do what I want to do is...now.

If someone wants to call this realization a mid-life crisis, go right ahead. Like I said, I just wish this simple fact had dawned on me much sooner with the intensity I now feel.

I feel good that I'm still entirely capable of surfing large waves on the Oregon coast. Or of skillfully riding the world's largest scooter. I may be 60 chronologically, but I feel more like 40 -- which, of course, is what the new 60 is.

Philosophically, what I said in an earlier post still stands:

I don't believe in life after death. I don't disbelieve in it, either. There's just no evidence to support the notion that we keep on living after our last breath, so I assume that whatever I want to do with my life, it had damn well better happen in this one.

When people hear that I'm getting a scooter, a common response is the same as what motorcyclists hear: But they're so dangerous!

Well, yes. So is climbing Mt. Everest. Much more so.

The death rate has remained at one death for every 10 successful attempts to climb Everest for many years, the British Medical Journal report states.

Yet we admire people who contemplate the mountaineering risk-to-reward ratio, and decide to place their bet on living life fully, with 29,029 feet of passionate gusto.

Others set out to ride a motorcycle or scooter. Or whatever. Why? Because -- no why's required, though they can be supplied upon request.

Life can end for any of us at any moment, some moments being more likely than others (when I turned sixty last year, this decade'al birthday helped me realize that I'm getting uncomfortably close to the higher probability phase of life -- so I'm justified in saying, "To hell with a mid-life crisis; I'm signing up for an end-of-life crisis").

It isn't good to come to the end of the road and think, I wasn't really ever on it, not the way I wanted to be. The only path that really matters is the one that leads us to ourself. If we're rolling down that Way with our passion throttle open and a smile on our face, excellent.

Nothing more to do. We can't control how long the ride will last. Just how authentically we experience it.

Clearview shield + Burgman 650 = (more) scooter joy

Good things are worth waiting for.

Yesterday the Clearview shield that I'd ordered in June to replace the stock Burgman 650 Executive shield arrived. (Orders have been so heavy, the wait time was long.)

Soon I had the old shield off and the Clearview installed. Which testifies to the product's quality and the clarity of the instructions, because in no way can I be called a mechanically proficient guy.

I got both of the Burgman 650 Clearview options: light grey tint and adjustable vent. In the photo you can see that the tint is pretty minor -- mild darkening of the grass and pavement is all.

After riding in bright Oregon sunshine yesterday (yes, it happens; July-September usually is reliably warm and clear) I was happy that I chose the tint. It takes the edge off of glare, while adding a touch of Harley'esque darkness to my safe and stylish Burgman vibe.

The vent looks like it will be a cool (literally) addition to my scooter come 90 degree plus riding days, which are forecast for early next week. It's adjustable to direct air upwards, to helmet, or straight on, to chest.

In the top photo you can see that the Clearview shield extends out to the edge of the hand grips, more or less. So when colder weather hits, this will be an advantage over the six inch narrower stock shield.

When ordering the shield, I pondered height choices.

The Burgman 650 Exec has an adjustable windshield with 2.5 inches of difference between "low" and "high." At "high," the eyes on my six foot body could just look over the stock windshield, which I liked (dark glasses, plus helmet visor, plus windshield is three things to look through).

But I do a good share of my scootering in town. We live about six miles from the city limits, so have a nice blend of 35-55 mph rural riding and 25-45 mph city riding when I head into Salem.

At lower speeds, for sight distance purposes I like the Burgman shield lower than the stock "high" setting. So if I'd gotten the large (2.5" taller) Clearview, the new "low" would have been the old "high." Which seemed too high.

I'm happy with my medium (1.5" taller) choice.

Now I look through the Clearview shield at the high setting, and have a nice view over it at the low setting. Wind buffeting at 50-70 mph or so, a common problem with the stock shield that bothered me, is much reduced now.

It isn't gone entirely. However, most things in life involve trade offs.

I'm willing to trade some wind noise for more unobstructed visibility over the shield. Reading rider reviews on the Clearview site, it's a "different strokes for different folks" thing. If I was doing a lot of freeway riding, I can see that a taller screen might have been a better choice. But so far in 900 Burgman miles I haven't set a tire on a freeway.

Bottom line: you won't go wrong with a Clearview shield. I've gotten quick answers to my emailed and telephoned questions. These guys have great customer service. And good quality control.

They told me that my order was about to be shipped. Then they said it'd be a couple of days delayed, because the shield didn't pass inspection. They made another one, which appears flawless.

Installation-wise, my only real questioning moment came when I couldn't follow the instructions to only turn the mounting screws 4.5 revolutions, to avoid over-tightening. It seemed like once the screw started to "take," it was still loose 4.5 turns later. So I just tightened until the screw felt snug.

Still, I worried that I'd taken up too much give in the mount and emailed Clearview today, getting this response:

Hello Brian, I think you will be OK......I usually tighten them by feel also and there does get to be a good amount of resistance.....as long as you did not really crank on them to try to get them extremely tight.

Nice reassurance. I'll be riding to my Tai Chi class later today with no worries. Well, about my Clearview shield, at least.

Sartre, scootering, and sensuality

I didn't realize until today -- while happily riding around on my Suzuki Burgman 650 scooter, naturally -- that I had an overwhelming desire to use "Sartre" and "scootering" together in a blog post title.

Well, why not?

I've been re-reading John Paul Sartre's "Being and Nothingness." And I ride a  scooter. There's got to be a connection between existentialist philosophy and the joy I feel zipping around on two motorized wheels.

To me, it is sensuality. Which is why that word earned a place in the title also.

Since I got my Burgman in June, I've been leaving our Toyota Prius and Highlander in the garage whenever I can. Driving a car just seems so boring, so detached from the natural world, so insulated from sensual reality.

On the scooter I feel every bump in the road and each change of temperature. I'm much more aware of smells, sounds, sights.

Going around a turn, even at slow speed, isn't the bland routine two-dimensional experience that a car offers. A scooter or motorcycle adds a third vertical dimension of being: leaning, which is barely noticeable in most four-wheeled transportation.

For many people, and this certainly included me at one time, the meaning of life is to be found in something other than what is directly experienced. 

Abstractions -- love, honor, truth, divinity, god, or whatever -- are viewed as the real thing, while physical appearances are considered to be distractions, veils, coverings that hide the Platonic essence of life.

Sartre disagrees. So do I.

Riding on my scooter, I don't feel that reality could be any more real. Here's some quotes from Sartre's "The Pursuit of Being" chapter (Hazel Barnes translation).

The obvious conclusion is that the dualism of being and appearance is no longer entitled to any legal status within philosophy...For the being of an existent is exactly what it appears...The duality of potency and act falls by the same stroke. The act is everything. 

...That is why we can equally well reject the dualism of appearance and essence. The appearance does not hide the essence, it reveals it; it is the essence. 

Pleasure can not be distinguished -- even logically -- from consciousness of pleasure. Consciousness (of) pleasure is constitutive of the pleasure as the very mode of its own existence, as the material of which it is made, and not as a form which is imposed by a blow upon a hedonistic material.

...Being is. Being is in-itself. Being is what it is.

When I drive a car, I feel a duality akin to a hypothesized "being" and "appearance." Meaning, what really counts for me is getting to where I'm going. Then, I think, my day will finally get going.

Once I get to the store. Or my Tai Chi class. Or the coffeehouse. (I'm retired, so getting to work isn't on my list of to-do's.)

On my scooter, though, I enjoy the traveling as much, or more, as the destination. The Burgman is faster and more maneuverable than my car. Yet I find myself in the slow lane more often, because I don't care if it takes me a little bit longer to get somewhere.

The getting is as much my where as the place I'm headed toward. 

Which leads to the nothingness side of Sartre's "Being and Nothingness." He talks about walking along a precipice. It is something to be avoided, a danger, because of deterministic causes outside of himself.

Loose pebbles. Crumbling earth.

Through these various anticipations, I am given to myself as a thing; I am passive in relation to these possibilities; they come to me from without; in so far as I am also an object in the world, subject to gravitation, they are my possibilities. 

Some people are afraid of riding a scooter or motorcycle. But the truth is that motorcycling or scootering is as dangerous as you make it. 

You. The world is what it is. Like Sartre said, "Being is." There's a lot to be afraid of in life. Dangers abound if we view ourselves as objects capable of being hurt or destroyed by other objects.

Such as cars, if you're on a scooter. Here's what Sartre has to say about dealing with a precipice -- of any sort, really.

My reaction will be of the reflective order; I will pay attention to the stones in the road; I will keep myself as far as possible from the edge of the path. I realize myself as pushing away the threatening situation with all my strength, and I project before myself a certain number of future conducts destined to keep the threats of the world at a distance from me.

These conducts are my possibilities. I escape fear by the very fact that I am placing myself on a plane where my own possibilities are substituted for the transcendent probabilities where human action had no place.

That's just how I feel on my scooter. A whole lot more me than when I'm driving a car. In the car I'm surrounded by airbags, crumple zones, roof pillars, a whole lot of metal.

Scootering, my safety depends mostly on how well I pay attention to what's going on around and within me. I'm much more actively involved in creating my possibilities -- moving from one side of a lane to the other as traffic circumstances change, for example. 

Sartre calls this sense of freedom, "anguish."

Yes, choosing what to do can have an anguish'y quality. But I think this French existentialist was unduly negative, or maybe something has been lost in the translation that produces the English "anguish."

On my scooter I feel that I'm making many more choices than I do while driving a car. That's part of why scootering is so much fun!

To stop or slow down I've got two brakes to squeeze (front and back), not just one pedal. I have to pay more attention to sight distance, the radius of curves, which way a parking space slopes. Like Sartre says, I'm creating my own possibilities through action, not largely passively motoring along.

I think a lot less on my scooter. I'm sensing a lot more. The natural world is very much with me, not the conceptual world of talk radio and PBS, which used to often be a focus of my attention as I coped with boring car driving with audio stimulation.

Now, what is right around me, is enough. Sartre would understand that, I'm pretty sure.

A scooter will change your life! Here's why.

I'm approaching the one-month anniversary of getting a Suzuki Burgman 650 Executive scooter. I can predict pretty well how Burgie and I will celebrate: by going for a ride!

As you can tell by the exclamation marks in this blog post title and first paragraph, I'm enjoying my new scootering life even more than I thought I would. Yes, I am!

So much so, I run the risk of becoming a scooter evangelist, which is kind of scary given my churchless leanings. I don't want to end up going door to door, on my Burgman, naturally, handing out pamphlets that say, "Repent your car-nality! Scooters save!"

(Note: I include motorcycles in my praise of two motorized wheels. However, scooters make so much more sense to me -- quieter, no manual shifting, more storage, easier to get on and off, etc. -- I heartily recommend considering them over a motorcycle; my Burgman is as powerful and large as a motorcycle, without the drawbacks).

Rather than becoming an annoying Scooter Witness, I figured proselytizing via my blog is a better way to go. Here, then, are some reasons why scootering will change your life, based on my first 28 days of experience.

(1) No talk radio. Or any radio. I've been riding my scooter almost exclusively since I got it, the summer weather here in Oregon having been perfect for two-wheeling it. Usually I drive our Prius only one day a week, when I do the grocery shopping.

I've been wondering why I feel calmer. Not so upset about current events. Much less inclined to want to throw people on the opposite side of my political leanings into a bottomless pit. Then I realized: I haven't been listening to talk radio.

Or any radio. Scootering, all I do is drive (you need to, to stay alive, given the greater risk, albeit manageable, of riding a scooter or motorcycle).

No playing with a cell phone either. Or my car's climate controls (on my scooter, to warm up I close vents and zippers on my jacket; to cool down, the opposite). It's wonderfully refreshing to simply be doing one thing while I ride along: riding along.

(2) Life is a whole lot livelier. Motorcyclists and scooterers call cars "cages." Apt term. They keep us insulated from nature and sensory inputs, both natural (smell of a newly mowed field) and unnatural (diesel exhaust fumes).

I love being out there on my scooter. I notice things along familiar roads that escaped my attention before. Just coming to a stop sign or light is an adventure.

I roll off the throttle, feeling the Burgman's considerable engine braking coming into play. Bumps in the road are evident. As is the bumper of the car ahead of me, no longer hidden behind an enclosed windshield.

I'm right there, life to every side of me, clearly evident with a turn of my helmeted head. (In my Team Oregon motorcycle safety class, the instructor pointed out that helmets don't obscure your peripheral vision as some riders claim. This is even more true of my Arai helmet, which has a 10 mm wider eyeport than usual.)

(3) More connections with other people. Partly I'm talking about the "motorcycle wave," which is cool -- a left hand acknowledgement to my fellow rider that we're part of a brother- and sisterhood of people who choose to travel to their own two-wheeled drummer, unlike the cagers.

I enjoy getting and giving the wave, which has some subtleties to it. Since my Burgman looks a lot like a motorcycle, especially from the front, I'm getting more waves than I expected -- since I was warned by a Suzuki salesman that I'd never get a wave from a Harley rider, given I was on a scooter and, horror of Harley horrors, a Japanese machine.

However, I have. And I've decided that regardless of whether the other person waves back, I'll wave at passing motorcycles, scooters, and bicycles, anything and anyone on two wheels. 

Also kids in a crosswalk. I did this last week and had one of those only-on-a-scooter moments. I was stopped at a downtown intersection. A father and two young children walked by in front of me. A boy turned in my direction, idly looking at the stopped traffic.

I raised my right gloved hand. Gave him a wave. His eyes opened wide. A big smile popped out on his face. He and I had made human contact! None of the people in cars were visible, hidden behind glass and long hoods. The kid and I were right there, together. 

Riding off, when the light turned green, I thought: Man, this is why I love scootering.

(4) You'll embrace your wild side. We all have one, a wilder side than we normally show to others. But let's face it: if yours isn't sufficiently developed, you won't enjoy a scooter or motorcycle.

Motorized two-wheeling takes some special skills. It also requires a bit of daring, being more dangerous than driving around in a seat-belted air-bagged car.

But when you pull up in front of wherever you're going, even if you're on a 50 cc Vespa, you're going to feel like Brando when you pull off your helmet. (OK, Brando didn't wear a helmet, but you should, because it isn't cool to be dead...or brain-dead.)

Maybe you have an urge to climb Mt. Everest, hitchhike through South America, or break the bank at Monte Carlo. Sure, you could try to do those things. Why not stay at home and just ride a scooter, though?

You'll express a side of yourself that needs expressing, at less cost, time, and trouble. Plus, you'll be able to stop at the store and pick up whole wheat torillas. Scooters are pretty practical, given their under seat storage. 

I remember reading a story about a Marine in Iraq who explained why he enlisted: "I wanted to do something that could kill me," he said. Sort of a strange quote, but not really. I feel like I understand what the guy meant.

Life is risky. Taking risks, reasonable ones, makes life more vibrant, alive. People have told me, "scooters are dangerous."

Well, yes. So is life. None of us make it out alive. What matters is how fully we live life. That's an individual decision, what makes us feel Yes, Yes, Yes! rather than a blah, That was OK.

My scooter does that for me. One could do the same for you. Something to think about. But not too long. Life doesn't last forever. Our living has to be done now.

Looking safe and stylish on my Burgman 650 scooter

Three weeks after my first three days on my Suzuki Burgman 650 maxi-scooter, I've still got plenty of smiles on my two-wheeled motoring face.

With plenty of warm and dry weather here in western Oregon (pretty typical for June-September), I've been riding as often as possible. A big part of my scootering enjoyment, aside from the hugely lovable Burgman, has been my choice of riding gear.

I want to be safe on my scooter. I also want to be comfortable. And, naturally, stylish. I feel like I'm batting three for three with the gear I bought prior to picking up the Burgman.

This was a personal decision -- every motorcyclist/scooterer has a unique vibe they want to present to the world, and themselves -- but maybe my choices will be of interest to those facing a similar gear selection decision.

Here I am in my riding glory, prepared to hop on my 2009 Burgman 650 Executive, which now has close to 300 miles on it.

From head to toe, I'm outfited in...

(1) Arai Corsair-V full face helmet. These are absurdly expensive. But I got $200 in gear purchase credit when I bought the scooter, and a 10% discount on Cycle Country purchases because I also bought a maintenance contract (Burgman service reportedly is spendy).

And it turned out that this was by far the most comfortable helmet I tried on. I'd ordered a Shoei flip-face helmet. However, after wearing it around the house for just ten minutes, my forehead had a red-spotted pressure point.

I took the Shoei back, and tried on a bunch of other helmets. Didn't feel good in any of them. Then the sales guy reached up to a top shelf, took down a helmet, and said, "Here, try this." I did.

And replied, "Wow, this feels great. First helmet that had even pressure all around my head." (My powerful brain apparently presses out my forehead, because most helmets constricted me front to back.)

Then I asked the price. And said even louder, "Wow!"

The salesman told me, "That's why I show people the Arai last." Meaning, when you can't find a helmet that fits, and the Arai does, you're more willing to fork out the big bucks.

Anyway, I've been happy with the Corsair-V. Great vision, lightweight, nice ventilation, never too hot or too cool, doesn't fog up. It's a Japanese technological marvel, like my scooter.

(3) Olympia Moto Sports GT Air All Seasons Transition jacket and Airglide 2 Over Pant. I did a lot of online jacket research before picking this one. No regrets.

When I took my Team Oregon motorcycle safety training class last month, at the first session the instructor picked up a snazzy looking jacket and said, "This is what I wear."

Cool, I thought -- the exact Olympia Moto Sports gear that I'd recently purchased. Even the same neon yellow/pewter color scheme. I like the looks of both the jacket and pants, plus how they feel. Good armor protection that isn't too obtrusive.

When I picked up my scooter, the temperature was in the low 60s. Today, I was riding in the low 90s. The jacket and pants are comfortable in pretty much every condition, what with the venting possibilities and the insulated waterproof liners that can be zipped in (I've removed them for summer, obviously).

(4) Icon Pursuit gloves. I like the curved shape to the gloves, and the knuckle protection. They're soft and comfortable. Probably I'll need cool weather gloves eventually, but for now these Icons are fine.

(5) Klim Transition boots. Cycle Country had just started carrying these Goretex boots, which look like hiking shoes (and might well be). They aren't the traditional black leather boots, and I'm glad about that. I'm willing to trade some ankle protection for a scooterish vibe.

Plus, the yellow laces and highlights on the boots match my jacket's neon yellow almost perfectly. Sweet. The Harley guys in their black leather who sit outside of Starbucks won't think much of my boot and other gear choices, of course. As if I care.

One of the great things about the Burgman 650 is that it has a large storage compartment under the seat. I can put my riding pants, jacket, gloves, and helmet in there, with a bit of room to spare.

Frequently, though, I'll leave on the over pants if I'm going into a coffee house, to my Tai Chi class, into a store, or such. The pants look good, and speak this is a biker dude to those in the riding gear know.

However, sometimes I take the pants off when I park the scooter-- hoping that I've remembered to leave my shorts on before I left the house. The Airglide 2 pants have velcro fasteners at the bottom plus a zipper that runs most of the way up the leg.

I can either step out of the pants while leaving my boots on, or take the boots off and remove the pants without fussing with the velcro and zippers.

Either way, once all my riding gear is off and stored under the seat, I'm looking stylishly dressed (by casual Oregon standards), and can comfortably head anywhere.

Recently I went to a waterfront festival dressed like this, except I brought along some sandals in the back pack that I almost always carry on a scooter ride (usually under the seat, taking it with me when I stop).

I took off the boots, put on the sandals, and carried the boots with me in the back pack -- since they wouldn't fit under the seat along with all the other gear.

System worked fine. Much better than having to lock a helmet and jacket to a motorcycle, or carry your gear with you -- as I see some motorcyclists doing.

After three days on my Suzuki Burgman 650, I'm smiling

Defying those who told me, when I mentioned my upcoming maxi-scooter purchase, "But motorcycles are so dangerous!," I am still alive -- and indeed thriving -- after three days of riding my Suzuki Burgman 650 (Executive version).

Credit goes to me, some great Team Oregon safety/skills training, and a terrific scooter.

Which I've managed to cram into our carport along with two cars, some garbage cans, and a bunch of firewood (one pile had to be moved to accommodate the Burgman).

As shown, the mirrors can be folded in with a touch of a button. Handy for darting between lanes of stopped traffic and squeezing into other tight spaces. Like our carport, when both cars are parked there.

Every time I ride the scooter I learn something. It's a lot heavier than the Yamaha Seca II I had about fifteen years ago. You need to plan ahead when you park a Burgman 650, because you're not going to be pushing it uphill (unless you have some friends with you).

Doing errands is an adventure on a scooter, not a chore. Sure, the thrill will lessen over time, but it's unarguable that getting around is lots more fun on two wheels, especially if they're motorized.

Today I mailed a package at the post office, exercised at our athletic club, and bought some oh-so-delicious Oregon strawberries from an outdoor stand.

Scootering slows you down, pleasantly.

I'm usually in a mild rush as I check off errands on my to-do list. On my Burgman, as with any scooter or motorcycle, there's a rhythm to starting and stopping that has to be followed.

I arrive at the post office. Turn off the scooter. Lower the side stand. Get off the bike. Open the compartment under the seat. Take off my gloves and dark glasses. Remove my helmet. Put gloves and helmet in the compartment. Take jacket off and store it under the seat also. Do my mailing business. Come back to the scooter and reverse the process to "gear up."

It's much different from opening a car door, sitting down, and driving off (in our Prius, it isn't even necessary to get a key out).

This may sound strange, but the lengthier steps needed to get on or off the Burgman feel like a kind of foreplay to me. It's so much fun to ride, I don't mind putting on pants, jacket, boots, helmet, gloves, and dark glasses before I start the engine.

Once I turn the throttle and the scooter starts moving, Burgman and me are in the moment together. If it takes a few minutes to get the passion underway, no problem.

Especially when the goal is safe scootering, the two-wheeling analogy to safe sex.

In the athletic club locker room I was wearing my Olympia Airglide 2 pants. Sitting on a bench to get changed, a guy asked me what I was riding.

"A Suzuki Burgman..."
"650," he said, finishing the sentence for me. "Great bike."

We had a nice conversation. The guy obviously was a knowledgeable motorcyclist. He said he'd just gotten back from a business trip to Utah, which doesn't have a helmet law. He was appalled at how casually some riders were dressed.

"I wear full gear all the time," he said. "Even when it's 100 degrees."
"Excellent," I told him. "I'm planning to do the same."

Yes, putting on a motorcycle jacket, pants, and boots isn't as easy as just jumping on a bike in shorts, t-shirt, and athletic shoes (which is how I was dressed most of the time when I rode a Honda 55 in high school and college).

But healing from preventable injuries if you have an accident is much more of a pain. Literally.

Anyway, scootering and motorcycling is so much fun, it doesn't matter what you're wearing. You'll have a smile on your face (most of the time, at least) regardless of how you are clothed, so it might as well be safely.

Ah, almost forgot about the strawberries. The roadside stand didn't have any bags, so I walked away with an open quart container filled to the brim.

I put them in the underseat compartment. Drove the eight miles home. Found that precisely one strawberry had rolled out of the container. Try doing that on a Harley. Scooters rule!

Team Oregon motorcycling class has me ready to ride

I just spent fifteen hours learning how to operate a motorcycle safely and skillfully. And enjoying the company of these soon-to-be biker babes, four women who comprised the more attractive side of the ten person class.

The three day Team Oregon Basic Rider Training is terrific -- highly recommended for both new riders and those, like me, who are getting back into motorcycling/scootering after a long absence.

Here's some advice if you think your motorcycle skills will revive instantly if you hop back on your Harley, or whatever, after several years (in my case, it was about fifteen years).

You're wrong.

I'd taken the same Team Oregon class before buying a Yamaha Seca II in the 1990s. I rode that bike for almost a year before selling it. So I wasn't a neophyte to motorcycling.

Yet the first half hour or so of the on-bike skills and safety training had me feeling pretty darn shaky. Even going at slow speeds on a wide open Chemeketa Community College parking lot, which had been roped off for the occasion.

I'm really glad I took the course over again before picking up my Suzuki Burgman 650 Executive maxi-scooter.

It isn't good to make basic motorcycling mistakes in traffic, which would be easy to do if someone is getting reacquainted with the tricky controls most bikes have. (Scooters shift automatically, which makes driving them quite a bit simpler.)

Much better to make those mistakes on a parking lot under a skilled instructor's watchful eye.

I had the most trouble with the quick stop maneuver, which entailed accelerating in second gear, and then stopping as quickly as possible, while downshifting, when the front wheel passed an orange traffic cone.

Roll off the throttle with right hand. Squeeze front brake lever with four right fingers smoothly and progressively harder. Press on rear brake with right foot, progressively softer. Pull in clutch with left hand. Press down on shifter with left foot.

At first, all that is like rubbing your head with one hand and patting your stomach with the other hand -- except you're doing it while traveling 15-20 mph and aware that the instructor and your class mates are watching to see how you do.

OK, in my case. Not great, though I had my quick-stop moments.

I was given a "dual sport" (dirt/street) bike to use that was pretty rough, and wouldn't shift into neutral when stopped. So I developed a lot of left hand strength from having to hold in the clutch while I was waiting in line with the engine on to do the next exercise.

My strong point was turning. I loved the turn exercises -- finding the right speed and the right line in a lane through a turn (usually outside, then inside to the apex, and outside again).

The camaraderie between my fellow students also was enjoyable.

Motorcycling attracts disparate people who are bound together by a passion for motorized two-wheeling. We ranged from a black clad bearded Harley type to a mother who brought her Vespa (she zipped along damn speedily, I was pleased to see, being a scooter'er myself).

Our lead instructor, David, was a sixty-one year old psychotherapist. His gray hair and beard made me like him right away -- plus think, for a fairly obvious reason, "Man, that is a good looking guy."

Proving that he was an Oregon motorcycling instructor, David threw in some New Age'y observations during the classroom portion of the training.

I like to ride with a sense of chi, with energy, to make me more visible to other drivers.

I think motorcycling attracts people because it activates the lower chakras, which don't get much work in our culture.

Cool. I don't know how this stuff went over with the Harley types, but this vegetarian Tai Chi scooter guy liked it.

Tomorrow I pick up my Burgman. I'll try to make sure that my chi is energized. A Starbucks latte should do the trick.

Motorcycling is as dangerous as you make it

As noted before, when people hear that I'm getting a Suzuki Burgman 650 scooter, the response often is: "But motorcycles are so dangerous!"

(The Burgman is as big and powerful as a mid-sized motorcycle, so I'll refrain from saying scootering in this post and stick with "motorcycling.")

Danger needs to be a consideration in everything we do in life. The risk of motorcycling certainly has to be taken into account by both aspiring riders and those who care about them.

But here's why I believe it's truer to say, "Motorcycling is as dangerous as you make it."

Before deciding to get back into riding, I studied motorcycling accident statistics (didn't come across scooter-specific data, which probably are mixed in with motorcycles).

They can be pretty sobering and scary.

Motorcyclists were 35 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in a crash per vehicle mile traveled in 2006 and eight times more likely to be injured, according to NHTSA.

Here's the thing, though. Those figures are on average.

They include motorcyclists driving drunk or stoned, not wearing a helmet, speeding like crazy, lacking protective gear, unlicensed to drive a motorcycle, those who haven't taken a motorcycle safety course, and such.

Nobody wants to be average. Especially when it comes to staying alive and healthy.

So the most informative (and inspiring) web site I came across in my motorcycle accident statistic research was this one: an article by James R. Davis called "Beating the Odds Requires that You Act ABNORMALLY."

Must it be true that your passion for motorcycles requires that you end up dead or injured in a motorcycle related accident sooner or later? Of course not! So, how do you beat the odds?

Statistics are only true if the population behaves 'normally.' Let me explain...

A substantial number of motorcycle accidents involve a rider who has been drinking. So, if on occasion you drink and drive, you are acting 'normally' as to the statistics and they are more closely predicting what will happen to you. A substantial number of accidents occur when 'luck' runs out - you drive through a yellow light and a truck happens to run over you in the intersection. But many, if not most, motorcyclists rely on luck to get them through a ride in just such a scenario. To the extent that you rely on 'luck' you are acting 'normally' relative to the statistics - you are trying to insure that they are self-fulfilling predictors.

What DOES make a difference in statistical outcomes is BEHAVIOR that is at variance with 'normal.'

Davis then explains further what he means. Common sense stuff. And reflective of the idea that almost all motorcycle accidents are avoidable, capable of being prevented by the rider. Davis says:

The fact is that it is more dangerous to ride a motorcycle than it is to ride in a passenger car. The way to beat the odds is to BEHAVE in ways that decrease YOUR odds of being involved in an accident or being injured or killed if you are in one. In other words, you must behave 'abnormally'. (i.e., defensively, intelligently, soberly, with learned (practiced) skills, with protective gear and as if your life depends on it, because it does.)

Relying on luck (odds) is simply stupid.

Excellent advice.

When I was 16, way back in 1965, I got a Honda 55 trail bike. I took it to college and rode it my freshman and sophomore years. So that's about four years of extensive riding in both the country, where I grew up, and the city of San Jose, California, where I went to college.

I never wore a helmet. Nor any sort of protective gear. Had on shorts, t-shirt, and tennis shoes much of the time. The bike was way under-powered, top speed not much over 45 mph, if that. No leeway to get out of trouble quickly.

I laid the bike down a few times. Worst injury I got was cutting my knee when it fell over at low speed in a school driveway. I was lucky.

Now, I'm older and wiser.

I'm re-taking the three day Team Oregon Basic Rider Training course, even though I already have my motorcycle endorsement. I've gotten a great set of protective gear: helmet, textile jacket and pants, footwear, gloves.

And I plan to wear the stuff all of the time.

Motorcycling, and scootering, is tremendous fun. Also, Green, given the lesser environmental impact of two-wheeled motorized transportation (gas mileage, parking needs, and so on).

Don't let the perceived dangerousness stop you, if this is what you want to do. Just realize that while the risks are real, they can be much reduced by riding better than average.

UPDATE: Here's a link to another good article about riding a motorcycle safely, "Discover the Top 10 Motorcycle Safety Tips for Responsible Bikers."

Let loose the person you really are

I want to get as much mileage as possible out of the Suzuki Burgman 650 scooter that will be coming my way in a few weeks. And I'm not just talking about how much gasoline I put in the tank.

There's a lot of blogging possibilities with motorized two-wheeling.

So I've added a "scootering" category to HinesSight in anticipation of sharing fresh views of life as it will appear through my Shoei helmet.

Presently I'm in a philosophizing mode, because my main reason for wanting a maxi-scooter (meaning, a big one) is pretty darn profound: I want to let loose the Brian that I know I am, but often keep caged up.

Most of us do this. Could be everybody. For one reason or another we go through life acting one way outside, while feeling another way inside.

Sometimes this is appropriate. Civilization requires some stifling of impulses.

But often we simply get into habits of inauthenticity -- lazily allowing ourselves to become someone we aren't, a persona others have learned to associate with the name we go by, yet which leads us to say "I'm not that guy."

Breaking out of this self-imposed cage often is dismissed with a he (or she) is just having a mid-life crisis.

To which I respond: Hey, it's never too early, or too late, to have a life crisis. What is life for, if not crisis'ing? Doesn't Zen encourage us to live every day as if your hair was on fire?

And didn't another source of wisdom, namely me, expound scooterishly on my other blog upon the theme, "Follow your passion wherever it leads"?

Now, I don't want to over-philosophize my desire for a Suzuki Burgman. However, this is absolutely true: ever since I ordered it, I've felt different about myself. More, well, me. As I wrote before:

I realized that when I thought about getting on two motorized wheels again (I had a small Honda trail bike in high school and college, and a mid-sized Yamaha motorcycle about fifteen years ago) I'd feel a sensation of Oh, yeah, that's me!

Not that I'm a motorcycle or scooter. But that I'm the sort of person who enjoys riding one, who likes taking risks in the pursuit of fun, who has a bit of Brando in me.

This isn't you. I'm me. You're you. I'm just saying that each of us, you, me, everybody, knows where our passions lie.

Maybe they're precisely reflected in what we're doing, thinking, and feeling now. Most likely, they aren't. Because for good reasons, and also for not-so-good reasons, we often trade passion for something else.

Life is short. The universe is 14 billion years old. It will continue for many more billions. If we humans live to be 100, that's amazingly long by Homo sapiens standards. 

And astoundingly short by any sort of cosmic measure.

I don't believe in life after death. I don't disbelieve in it, either. There's just no evidence to support the notion that we keep on living after our last breath, so I assume that whatever I want to do with my life, it had damn well better happen in this one.

When people hear that I'm getting a scooter, a common response is the same as what motorcyclists hear: But they're so dangerous!

Well, yes. So is climbing Mt. Everest. Much more so.

The death rate has remained at one death for every 10 successful attempts to climb Everest for many years, the British Medical Journal report states.

Yet we admire people who contemplate the mountaineering risk-to-reward ratio, and decide to place their bet on living life fully, with 29,029 feet of passionate gusto.

Others set out to ride a motorcycle or scooter. Or whatever. Why? Because -- no why's required, though they can be supplied upon request.

Life can end for any of us at any moment, some moments being more likely than others (when I turned sixty last year, this decade'al birthday helped me realize that I'm getting uncomfortably close to the higher probability phase of life -- so I'm justified in saying, "To hell with a mid-life crisis; I'm signing up for an end-of-life crisis").

It isn't good to come to the end of the road and think, I wasn't really ever on it, not the way I wanted to be. The only path that really matters is the one that leads us to ourself. If we're rolling down that Way with our passion throttle open and a smile on our face, excellent.

Nothing more to do. We can't control how long the ride will last. Just how authentically we experience it.