Thursday, January 12, 2006

hooky

lessons

What are doing?
Working. What are you doing?
Working. But it’s fifty degrees outside. Warm enough for your trial run.

So, before I teach you how to ride this thing, can you remember that there is a hand brake and a foot brake and you should use both?
What’s that?

The clutch. Maybe you should stay with just first gear today.

I meant to put it neutral! How did it jump to second? And why is the damn gas pedal in the handle bar? !

Ed and the art of motorcycle maintenance. Nina and the art of relying on someone else to maintain anything mechanical given that she knows nothing about machines.

So there are two gas chambers...
I listen patiently. I need to know this stuff. The intent is for me to be able to manage any old wreck of a motorbike this spring in rural France. I’m to work there in quiet surroundings for weeks on end. All I need is a village (found one), a set of rooms (found them), a local hero willing to set me up with the Internet (done), and a motorbike to get me places (working on that).


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bright skies and promises

No question. Today’s sun fills your soul with winter warmth. We pause to watch a metal sculptor load his pieces onto a truck for an exhibit.

She’s sunbathing, I think.


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On Lake Waubesa, the ice is cracked and puddles of water are forming on the surface. Big Ed walks out a few feet onto the lake. The ice remains firm. Little me follows. It cracks and I see my shoe getting wet. You weakened it, that’s why!



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And then, suddenly the wind turns cold. I take pictures from the back of the cycle as we speed back toward Madison. The sun again. Making a painting out of winter trees.




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And then the moon. Framed by the knuckles of the limbs, striking against the perfectly clear sky.




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