I tend to think I am a blessed fellow. Sure I can complain with the best of them, but in reality, I am okay.
A month ago, I posted about my friend Kerry succumbing to injuries after going down. Yesterday, I met up with most of the guys that rode on Kerry’s memorial ride and we got to talking about what has happened to our group in the last two months. Here is the recap:
· In late September a buddy named Bobby (63 years) low-sides on a curve, totals his bike, and breaks his left arm and several ribs. Can’t walk so Kerry picks him up and carries him up the hill to the pavement to await the meat wagon.
· In October, Kerry goes down on the way home from work, totals the bike, breaks most of his body and then passes on a few days later. (59 years)
· A dozen or so of us go on Kerry’s ride and Bobby drives behind us all with his arm in a splint.
· A week after this ride, another Bobby is sideswiped on the freeway by a soccer mom in the mini-van merging into him. He goes down, totals the bike and breaks his right arm and shoulder blade, but gets up and walks it off till the meat wagon arrives. He is 57 years old.
· Next up is Tommy (60 years) who goes to the doctor with a back pain so bad he can’t ride. Doc finds a tumor on his spine, they operate and three weeks later, he succumbs to cancer. His funeral is Wednesday.
· The day after the second Bobby gets hit, Donny (63 years) low sides on a curve on an off ramp coming home after dark, very similar to Kerry’s situation. Donny breaks his left arm, multiple ribs and his pelvis. He also fractured his left jaw, and left orbital bones. His left eye was punctured by bone shards and the doctors tell him if he keeps the eye, he will most likely be blind in it. It looks like they may take it though sometime this week. Of course, his bike too is totaled. Donny spent two weeks in the hospital and came home on Saturday and called in to say hi to everyone at the bar where we were meeting up to get the ride patches from Kerry’s ride.
· Finally is Brice, (43 YEARS). He is a rather big fellow and rides with a local MC. He is a plumber by trade and was using a cutting wheel last week to cut into an older cast iron sewer pipe. The cutter jumped back on him and spun into the top of his right hand. The cut is horrendous. The ER cleaned him up and sewed the wound shut. He went to a hand specialist the next day and was told it was infected and the doc opened it up and has now begun daily deep cleanings to rid the wound of the nasty stuff left inside. He will keep the hand most likely but if the specialist had not been queried, he might have lost it.
Now I know what some of you are thinking, don’t get into Boog’s group of riding friends. But I have to tell you that Dave, Tom, Mike, Jimbob, Ed, Alan, the other Dave and myself are all doing just fine…
Yep, I cannot complain about my life. I am a blessed one.