Hibernating

I guess it's getting that time of year to put the bike away for the winter. although I have been known in the past to ride throughout the winter, but I think I'm going to take this winter off.....Maybe.
It seems that motorcycles have always been a part of my life. I can remember one time when I was 7 riding through the woods near my parents house in Pennsylvania and brushing past a Crab Apple tree and getting a 2 inch thorn stuck in my finger. As I raced back to the house crying I managed to lose control of the bike, run through a fence and over my younger sister Mundy. Fortunately everyone survived, and we all continued to ride til this day. When I got older and got a street bike my mother and I rode all the time. My Father had a Harley and we all rode together touring Western Pennsylvania, and Ohio.
In August 1989 my mother and I were riding and had made plans to meet my father and a few of his Harley buddies for dinner at a local restaurant. That didn't happen. My mother and I were on a back road when a Ryder Moving truck crossed the center line and hit us with the outside mirror of the truck. It knocked my mother off the back of the bike and sent me fishtailing off the side of the road and then over the handlebars. Luckily we were both wearing helmets and leather. The only protection I wasn't wearing was gloves and I paid the price. I don't remember anything about the accident. but I was told that I slid down the edge of the road for about 50ft. on the front of my helmet. The first thing I remember was hearing my mother screaming. I got up and tried to find her when a person grabbed me and was trying to see if I was alright. I didn't notice the blood, or feel the pain in my hands, but when I got to my mother there was someone there with her. An Older couple were out in their garden when they heard the sound of the crash and came running over. We were both hurt and worried about each other, but didn't know what happened until the gentleman told us we had been hit by a moving truck. The lady had gone back to her house and called 911 and an ambulance was on it's way. My mother seemed okay accept she couldn't move her arm, but she wasn't. We asked the gentleman to call the restaurant and tell my father what had happened and to meet us at the hospital. My mother ended up with a shattered wrist and had to have 5 pins in her arm until it healed and 3 skin grafts to replace the skin she lost. I ended up with a combined 14 stitches in the palms of my hands. One of the things that saved my life the Doctor said was that I was wearing a full-face helmet. He said that if I would have had an open-face helmet and slid down the road 50ft I would have had no chin and probably bled to death. WOOHOO! thank god for me buying a KIWI full face helmet.
The cool thing was that the day my mother got released from the hospital she came home and she wanted us to go get new leathers, GLOVES, and helmets on my motorcycle, and we did. I guess it was quite a sight seeing a woman in a sling with pins in her arm on the back of the motorcycle. She still rides today.
February 2, 1994 is a day that changed my life. It had snow about 6 inches over night and I decided I would ride my motorcycle to work instead of my 4X4 truck. Not a good idea. I ended up sliding of the road and injuring my back. I ended up with a pinched cyactic nerve in my left leg and 2 herniated discs in my lower back. 10 months of psychical therapy, nerve blocks, EEG's and MRI's the doctor's decided the treatment wasn't working and the herniation's were getting worse, so they wanted to operate. November 4 was the operation and it was a success. When I awoke after the surgery I had Montana on my mind. How it got there I still don't know. Were the doctor's talking about "Joe Montana" or the State? Who knows. When my parents called my room at the hospital to tell me they were on their way to get me I told them to bring an atlas. When I got the atlas I opened it to Montana and told my parents I wanted to go to Montana. Their reaction was like everyone else's that I told that to in Pennsylvania, "Yeah, Right".
It took until October 12, 1998 after my sister's wedding when I quit my job, packed up my truck and headed out here to Big Sky Country. In April 1998 I began talking to a woman in Kalispell named Michele. Yes, the same Michele that is my best friend here today. I had talked to her and her parents and they said I could stay with them once I got out here until I got settled in. So with that I headed out west not knowing anything about Montana, and the rest they say is history.
Now because of the motorcycle, I am now in Montana. It's not a bad thing. I have to say the best ride I've taken here was a trip to Glacier National Park on the fourth of July. I rode one of my bikes, Michele rode her own, and a friend, Doug rode my other bike. It was a great trip, we all enjoyed ourselves.

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