I want to save your life.
When you get on your motorcycle, take the time to buckle a helmet on. I did, or I would be either severely brain-damaged or dead.
I wasn't paying attention, and after 40 years of riding, I did the unthinkable. I caused my own accident. I swore to myself this would never happen, but it did.
No cars or pedestrians — just me making a stupid mistake. I had to hit the brakes hard, and my bike went down.
A little lesson in physics here: When your shoulder hits the ground, your body stops. Your head doesn't. The inertia from the fall is transferred to your head. When I heard the sickening thump of my helmet on asphalt, I knew I had been spared significant brain damage or death.
I could feel the helmet liner compress. I remember thinking: "So this is how a helmet works." The liner slowed my head down and cushioned it from the whiplash effect of a 750-pound motorcycle throwing me sideways. The result was a wounded shoulder and hurt pride. My head? Nothing more than a stiff neck.
When you watch someone die in an accident that the rider could have walked away from, the memory never goes away. I have two friends who died doing less than 10 miles an hour. One was sand — the bane of bikers. The other was kissing the curb due to lack of attention. Both could have been a walkaway with some serious swearing. No helmet, no life. Simple as that.
I have seen a situation where everyone thought the rider was dead. He was doing a wheelie on Lake Street. The woman who pulled out in front of him never saw his headlight — it was aimed into the sky. He slammed on the brakes, his bike went over and he went head first into the car's wheel well. Knocked his shoes off.
