This story is a short one about a time I let my stubbornness and competitiveness get the better of me. Growing up my dad was never really a traditional “handyman” type of dad. He’s really not one to fix things around the house or build things, but when the opportunity does arise for him to show off the few skills he has in fixing or building things, he always jumps at it.
This time around it would appear one of our neighbors had thrown several broken bikes away near the communal dumpster. My dad, having taken cars and bikes apart quite a bit as a kid, was ecstatic at the chance to show off his bike assembling skills. He ravaged through the trash and was able to find enough working parts to put together one actual working bike.
Now, I did grow up rollerblading and riding bikes all over hell but now I was around the age of 14-15 and really didn’t cruise around town anymore. Also just recently my mom had moved into a pretty cool house (later known as Club 669 – more on that in a different story) close to my high school which was roughly 5 miles from my dad’s house.
One day I was chilling at my dad’s and thought it would be a nice day to go for a ride. I assumed I could ride to my mom’s since it wasn’t very far and just along one of the local highways. She wasn’t home at the time but I figured I could hangout there for a bit and ride back in the evening. Anyhow, I set off from my dad’s and I remember the bike wasn’t moving particularly smooth but I also hadn’t ridden a bike in a long time so I didn’t quite remember how smooth it was meant to feel. About a mile into the ride I was beginning to feel some heavy resistance and was really getting a bit of a workout in. I wasn’t moving very quick considering how hard I was pumping my legs and mind you, this bike ride I was doing was along the Old Redwood Highway which is a somewhat busy highway that stretches along Sonoma County. Another mile of this dragging slowly increasing more and more and I realized that it wasn’t just the fact that it was a heavy mountain bike, there had to be more going on than just that. I got off the bike and looked around, checking the brakes and making sure everything is in order. While doing so I realized that one of the tires was slightly crooked and was pushing against the side of the brake…. This meant that I was practically riding this bike with one of the brakes on and just burning away at the tire. Now, I don’t know much about bikes and I pulled and pushed all around and couldn’t get the brake off of the tire. I was faced with a tough decision, do I walk the bike back to my dad’s house, do I walk it to my mom’s, or do I accept the stupidity and stubbornness of me having ridden this far already with one brake engaged and just try to finish out the ride. Maybe not a tough decision for an average person, but as I’ve stated many times, I’m anything but average.
After a quick debate I came to the conclusion that I was too stubborn to just walk back either direction and the competitive side of me challenged myself to ride it out for the rest of the distance. Thus, with a bike that could barely move, I rode along this road, dripping sweat, thighs burning, just begging to get to get to this irrelevant finish line. Eventually, without stopping a second time, I did just that and somehow made it to my mom’s driveway where I collapsed onto the ground unable to lift a muscle. I laid there for awhile before receiving a call from my dad questioning where I’d disappeared to. With the fewest words I could gather I expressed my hatred for his bike-building abilities as well as sent out an S.O.S for help. He came to pick me up and was dumbfounded by the fact that I would knowingly ride a bike with the brakes engaged for nearly 5 miles for the sole purpose of not wanting to admit I had messed up.
All-in-all I think that bike ended up back in the trash and I couldn’t walk for about a week. I will admit that that day helped me grow more mentally tough and taught me that self satisfaction, regardless of how ridiculous the situation may be, is one hell of a nice feeling – no one got hurt and I only got stronger.
