Shortly after Kevin died we moved out into the country. Not that far out of town, about 7 miles actually. The farm was really nice, but things were a lot different at home. You could obviously feel the tension between my parents. The loss of a child is something I never want to experience. I guess they felt like they wanted to do something for me so they did what any parent would do that had just lost a sibling: Buy them a dirt bike!
I remember going into the dealership and sitting on the brand new bikes not knowing that they were going to buy one for me. I remember the bright yellow gas tank of the Yamaha. The only draw back was that they "thought" it was safer if it had lights, blinkers, and everything else on it. So I got the Enduro 80. It was awesome. The rest of the kids that lived out by us had the "real" dirt bikes, but I could have cared less. We had trails and jumps set up all over our property, at my friends houses, and everywhere you could think of. I got into some trouble on that thing. I remember one time the baseball field just got a new load of clay on the infield. My friends and I, I was definitely coerced into this one, thought it would be a great idea to play baseball on our bikes. Well it was great, until the township worker came to the house and said we had to fix the infield where we tore it up. The guy that came to the door said "If you are going to do something as stupid as this make sure you cover yours tracks up." We all rode back to my house after the game, and he followed the tracks right into the front yard. Hey we were 10-13 years old, definitely not brain surgeons. There was also the time where I got caught jumping a rock gorge at our house. It was only 5 feet wide, but like 15 feet deep. My dad was SOOOO ticked, he was yelling so much the spittle was flying out of his mouth nonstop. That was one of the first times of getting by bike taken away (and getting my a$$ whooped). I had the bike taken away a couple more times for running late on curfew, doing stupid stuff (see above and much much more, but there were two incidents that really stick in my mind.
The first: Clotheslines and Motorbikes
I was practicing wheelies in the yard, it was softer to fall in the grass than on the gravel roads. I was not paying attention to the clothes lines and drove into them. The lines were low enough that they pulled me off the bike by the neck, flipped me in the air, and firmly flopped me onto my back. I got up and tried to rip my helmet off grabbing at the chin strap, apparently looking like I am grabbing my throat. I had the wind knocked out of me pretty hard. My mom watched the whole ordeal and totally freaked out. She ran over expecting the worst and I was mad that I bent my license plate and blinkers. Dad was told about it later that night, got my A$ beat, and had the bike taken away for a month. I can see why she would be freaked out about it, but a beating and taking the bike away... A little too much if you ask me. If Dad didn't want me to do wheelies, then why the hell was he doing them on my bike?!?!
The second: Porn Night at Camp
There were about eight of us that were pretty tight in those days. We all had bikes of 3-wheelers, YES 3-wheelers, and we hung out constantly together. Well we were at Clint's house for the day and his parents were away for the day. We were goofing off in the house, and Clint had decided (on his own ;)) to pull out the Playboys, Hustlers, and Penthouses his dad had hidden in the closet. Everyone is sitting there looking at these things and it's almost time for his parents to come home. Someone comes up with a plan to bring ALL of them out to the camp, spend the night, look at porn, and see if some of the older guys could score some beer. So it was all set, the arrangements were made, I was staying at Clint's, Clint was at Brian's, Brian was at my house, well you get the picture... Well Brian scored some beer, Clint had the mags, and I had the food. We drove all of our bikes out to Brian's Uncle's camp to spend the night. We had a lot of fun that night, it was hilarious, there were mags scattered everywhere on the floor, a six pack of empty beer cans on the tables, and food scrapes EVERYWHERE. Unfortunately, the parents figured out where we were. It was about seven in the morning, and there is a loud pounding on the door. We thought someone was screwing around. WRONG! Every one of ours Dad's were outside waiting for us to answer the door. The door opened and you can imagine the looks on our faces when all of these mags are EVERYWHERE, beer cans (only six) strewn about, and our Dads totally ticked that we were all there. I think everyone that spent the night there got their a$es beat pretty good for lying. Of course the bike was gone for a month... Turns out Brian's younger brother ratted us out. He was dealt with appropriately.
Okay, now I feel old. I looked up a picture to post on the blog of the bike and found this description: VINTAGE 1986 Yamaha Enduro 80. WTF, VINTAGE?!?! Gimme a break!!!
