textfiles/fun/CAA/gecaa-39

From slcpi!govt.shearson.com!mjohnsto@uunet.UU.NET Tue Jan  8 09:47:20 1991
To: wordy@Corp
Subject: Part 39 of CAA #2

BLOOD IN THE SPOKES



#39 in the second online CAA series



by



Steven K. Roberts, HtN (WORDY)

Whiteville, NC; 14,634 miles.

November 22, 1987



copyright 1987, Steven K. Roberts





     It always happens fast.  On a crisp Friday morning in Whiteville, North

Carolina, I strapped on my helmet, booted up the bicycle control processor, and

reset the Cat-Eye.  The bike arpeggiated two octaves of major thirds and

queried in a voice mechanical but eager:  "Are you going to ride me now,

Steve?"  You bet, loony machine.  All systems are go... I clanged the handlebar

bell, hailed Maggie on 145.52 simplex, and waved good-bye to Clarabel -- the

70-year-old cyclist who had been our charming hostess for two days.  On the

road... bound for the coast.



     7/100 of a mile later it happened.  What had been the smooth brown bulk of

an irrelevant pickup truck parked to my right suddenly erupted into a swinging

door.  Where there had been open space, there was now hard steel.  Where once

was the peaceful dawn of a sunny riding day was now pain, blood, fractured

aluminum, pretzeled wheels, cops, sirens, photographers, crowds, gauze-wrapped

thighs, stretchers, and a once-poetic electronic megacycle sprawled clumsy on

the pavement with macabre bits of my flesh clinging to exposed corners.



     This is what we used to call a bummer, back in the Early Days



     The old man in the truck stared down at me in slow alarm.  I made a gentle

sarcastic comment about the purpose of rear-view mirrors while watching the

white furrows in my thighs fill with blood.  In morbid fascination, I pulled

hairy pieces of myself from the aluminum console mounts and tried to understand

what had happened.  Then I noticed the rear wheel:  within the constraints of

frame geometry, it had become a close approximation of a Pringles newfangled

potato chip.



     The truck door had apparently swung open as I passed, grazing my arm and

connecting with the bike at the rear derailleur -- forcing it into the spokes.

This formed a highly effective one-shot braking device, destroying both

derailleur and wheel in the process as I skidded forward, slamming into the

door with my Equinox trailer.  It now sported a badly bent tongue, torn fabric,

and a fractured frame -- and as I struggled to my feet I realized that my body

wasn't doing so well, either:  lower back pain kept me from standing up all the

way.



     People began to arrive.  A news photographer scurried about, documenting

the whole grisly affair for Monday's paper.  Clarabel hurried over, aghast that

this had happened in her town.  Herman, the old driver, stood around looking

unhappy, and a little kid gaped and gawked and oohed and ahhed about the bike.

"Aren't you supposed to be in school?" a policeman asked sternly.



     "I got s'pended fer fih'tin," he said.  "What'r all them radios for?"



     An ambulance pulled up.  People poured from houses, stopped their cars,

formed a circle around the grim carnage and pointed at various doodads of alien

gizmology.  Medics dressed in orange began dabbing thick brown Betadine on my

quads <wince> and wrapping them in gauze. But the bandages slipped down every

time I moved, so a couple of the EMT's kept following me around trying to fix

them.  I groped in the trailer and produced my cane, snapping it to its full

length as somebody exclaimed:  "Well I'll be!  He has his own walkin' stick!"

And before long Maggie and some bystanders were half-carrying the crippled

Winnebiko back to Clarabel's house as I was being helped into the ambulance --

wherein I had the unusual experience of hearing my vital signs read over the

radio.



     Marketing takes many forms.  Flat on my back on a gurney I explained the

bike, the book, the banged-up back.  Maggie handed flyers to hospital personnel

as they poked, prodded, squirted my arm full of tetanus vaccine, and tried to

understand how a bicycle going less than 10 mph could cause this odd

combination of injuries.  I lay around in the hallway for awhile, waiting for

painkillers to kick in while fending off the advances of an old malodorous

broken-footed drunk who kept slurring a barely comprehensible request for a

ride home.  "BICYCLE!" I finally said, moving my arms like my bloody legs once

had.  "I'm on a bicycle!"  He frowned, almost fell over, drooled, rolled yellow

eyes, exuded rank breath, looked down at the gurney under me, shook his head in

dizzy confusion and said, "Bahsel? Thain't no bahhsel..."



     X-rays showed the skeleton to be OK... so with friendly farewells to all

the staff and a not-too-encouraging nod to the drunk we rolled away in the cop

car, reminded of last year's wreck in Healdsburg and wondering how long it

would take to recover THIS time.



                                * *



     I write now from Clarabel's house.  She's an unusual lady:  how many

70-year-olds do you know who easily do hundred-mile bicycle trips, work out on

a rowing machine in front of the TV, and sponsor an annual "homemade ice-cream

ride" for local cyclists?  As luck would have it, she happened to have two

unoccupied apartments upstairs, so another CAA field office has been born --

the latest in a recent blur of marathon writing sessions intended to deliver on

all those impromptu commitments made over the last few months.  And besides,

there's bike-and-body repair to be done:  Our RAAM-riding friends from the

Raleigh area, Jim and Kathie Mulligan, motored down to build a new wheel, and

Fed-X should show up with new trailer parts any day now.



     Wheelbuilding's a bit of a wonder, if you've never witnessed the Art.

After we settled on one of a dozen or so possible lacing patterns (cross-4

symmetrical), Jim began weaving the 48 spokes into a complex web of balanced

tensions, spending hours making progressively more subtle adjustments until the

structure was flawlessly tuned.  At 3 AM, he seemed almost maniacal --

coffee-wired and obsessed -- straddling the truing stand and peering through

his glasses into submillimeter gaps, the spoke wrench tinking softly, his

breath coming in measured little gasps synchronized with the precise indexing

of the wheel and the metallic whisper of the calipers.



     Now that I think about it, it is not unlike the subtle interplay of

adjustments that can elevate a good piece of writing into a balanced work of

art -- or, just as easily, shatter the whole thing by pulling certain ideas too

tight, overstressing words that should be in balance.  I guess I am out spokin'

at times... rolling from a wheel- truing deal to true wheeling-dealing, toiling

at truth while reeling from the raw deal of a rear wheel's real ruin...



     Of course, there have been all sorts of other events since the last update

-- there always are.  Perhaps the most colorful is our visit to Fayetteville.



     It was a day that started perfectly.  We had spent the weekend with Jim &

Kathie, putting up a horizontal loop antenna, taking a code test (I'm a General

now:  salut!), rebuilding the bike's headset bearing, and otherwise sharing in

that technical camaraderie that comes from common passions.  It was only

natural that they should join us for the ride south from Raleigh, and they

climbed aboard their 2- meter equipped Santana tandem for the trek to Erwin.



     All went well.  The first cotton field of the journey surrounded us like

an infinite vat of chocolate-marshmallow ice cream, puffy sunlit tufts blazing

white in a background of uniform dead brown. Toying with repeaters, teasing,

tossing jokes to and fro, we pedaled the miles away.



     But the moment came, as come it must.  They turned back north to resume

their lives; we continued south to resume ours.  The interlude of new

friendship lingered like a recent movie, and as the growing distance between us

began to touch familiar voices with static we began looking ahead.  What next?



     Actually, it seemed no mystery, for another ham was awaiting our arrival

down the road.  A few nights before I had logged via a pair of NET/roms onto

the Fayetteville packet BBS, and within the hour Bruce Parkes, an Air Force

flight nurse, called and invited us to stay.  Now the only problem was to get

to his house -- and it was to be a 71-mile ride.



     But it wasn't the mileage that turned a day of warm play into a night of

cold hell, it was Fayetteville.  Not our delightful hosts... but the town

itself.  We quickly understood why everyone had warned us against going there.



     Bruce met us at the border on his motorcycle, with two beautiful little

girls perched pink and perky in the sidecar, watching shyly as we made our

introductions and got ready to run the downtown gauntlet. A 15-mile night ride

through a macho-tough Army town lay ahead, and the escort service may well have

saved our lives.



     Lurkers in the shadows.  Strip joints.  Glass.  Violent traffic, with

unkempt mufflers and aggressive bumper stickers proving that in this macho

subculture, might makes right.  One sticker declared: "Don't like my driving?

Call 1-800-EAT-SHIT"  (What kind of person would post such a sentiment on his

car for everyone to read?  Would you want to meet him under any circumstances,

other than a euthanasia proceeding?)



     It got worse.  As the highway narrowed into a shoulderless two- lane

deathtrap, the horns and shouts began.  "Get the hell off the road, you stupid

asshole!" shouted someone, his voice lost in his own explosive honking.

Fingers sprouted from rumbling Mustangs and GTOs; a beer can sailed from a

pickup.  For over an hour we endured this abuse, realizing that we should have

approached the city from a different side entirely.  Through it all, Bruce and

the girls bravely followed us -- holding back an angry queue of bile-sodden

rednecks choking on their own exhaust, trigger fingers doubtless itching as

delicious M-16 fantasies filled their mini-brains...



     Whenever possible, I would pull into a driveway -- trying to ease the

tension by letting people pass.  But they only saw it as a chance to Have Their

Say, and roared by us with shouted insults and floored accelerators.  How could

I have made them understand that it was not my fault, that they should complain

instead to a local government that allows a busy shoulderless high-speed

commute route like Cliffdale Road to exist?



     But then, Fayetteville is weird.  Our new friends were a pleasure -- the

kids cute and shy, the dog playful and cuddly, the adults an entertaining blend

of Air Force culture, active hobbies, unaggressive religion, and warm

hospitality.  But Fayetteville itself, well...  we took my bike to a meeting of

the local ham radio club.



     Normally, this is a predictable sort of experience.  People stand around

talking about radios, discuss upcoming events, sit through a technical

presentation, drink coffee, and have a drawing for a few unexceptional door

prizes.  But this meeting had a different flavor.



     "Could we all stand for the prayuh?"  The hubbub of 25 men ceased

instantly and chairs were shoved back for the spiritual CQ DX.  Heads bowed.

"Ouwah fawthuh, we reco'nize that you are th' supreme architect of th'

univuhse, and we ask thy blessin' as we meet heah tonah't... etcetera."  There

was a bass rumble of amens, then we all turned to face the American flag,

clasped our hands over hearts swollen with patriotic fervor, and intoned the

Pledge.



     "This sure ain't California," I whispered to Maggie as the meeting was

called to orduh.  Discussion for the first 15 minutes centered around a fellow

who had been invited to dinner by the club, then left without paying.

Apparently, picking up the tab hadn't been part of the deal, and in the poor

fellow's absence he was lambasted like a criminal.  One old man finally spoke:

"Now perhaps the gentleman was laboring under the misapprehension that the

invitation included the cost of the meal.  I move that we reimburse the club

member who covered the bill out of his own pocket, including whatever expenses

he may have incurred in his efforts to collect, and get on with it."



     Everybody seemed friendly enough, of course, warmly welcoming us to

Fayetteville and wishing us luck on the road.  But it was a startling culture

shock:  a ham radio club meeting that barely mentioned ham radio.  Our current

travel is a window into a widespread segment of mainstream American culture

that's quite different from "TV normal."  This is all highly subjective, of

course -- a few hours ago, a robust black mechanic named Jimmie looked up from

the vice- destruction of my old Phil Wood hub and asked, "You have quite an

accent.  Where are you from?"



     Yep, it's the South.  Every home we visit has a few Bibles, and almost

everyone on the street seems a visitor from the black and white video of the

50's.  Speech is filled with folk references and surprising twists ("You gotta

root, pig, or die," noted Clarabel, indicating that we should help ourselves in

the kitchen).  And easy flirtation, lifestyle experimentation, and liberal

attitudes are about as rare as tie-dyed shirts out here in the wilds of the

Great Southeast.  I suspect we'd be westbound in a hurry if it wasn't so

dad-burned friendly:  with the exception of Fayetteville, every North Carolina

town on our route has exuded a sort of conservative American warmth.  It's

relaxing after New York and DC... and the midwest could take a few lessons from

this as well.



                                * *



     Let's see.  There are a few technical events of note, but I'm tired --

they can wait.  A quick teaser, though:  the bike now has its own on-board BBS,

with a beacon identifying my activity and current location to the packet radio

community.  I can now emerge from a restaurant to find electronic mail waiting

for me right there in the console.  There'll doubtless be more on that in some

future high-tech rhapsody.



     In the meantime, I'm waiting for my traumatized quads to pump painlessly

again -- and watching for the arrival of a few components still required to

restore the Winnebiko's autonomy.  And then... deeper into the South we'll

go... with the fantasy beaches of Florida a sort of holy grail in the distance.

 Cheers from the East Ward!



          -- Steve

      OK, OK, just one more glimpse of Whiteville, North Carolina:



     As I was uploading this chapter, hunkered down on the sidewalk over the HP

computer with a cable going into the phone booth at the intersection of Lee and

Calhoun, a police car pulled up.  The door slammed, and I recognized the black

cop who had declared at the accident that I had no business being on the road

with a rig like that and was therefore at fault.  I nodded in greeting.  He

didn't smile.



     "What's going on here?" he demanded.



     "I'm sending out a story and getting my mail via satellite. See?"  I held

up the computer.



     Carefully maintaining a sour Dirty-Harry squint, he peered at the machine

and followed the wire into the phone booth.  "Hey, what's this!"



     "It's an acoustic coupler.  Turns my words into sound and transmits them

over the phone... and vice versa.  I do this all the time..."



     "We've had three calls this mornin' about you bein' out here messin' with

this pay phone.  I wanna know exactly what's going on."



     "I told you:  I get my mail this way.  This is what lets me run a company

while traveling by bicycle."



     He looked skeptical.  It was clear he was mentally reviewing the town

ordinances, hoping to find a charge to book me on.  It must have been a

frustrating task, for he asked a third time what I was doing. About then my

upload ended, so I hit BREAK and *S, causing GEmail to tell me the item was

sent and issue a new prompt.  I typed the DISPLAY command and showed him the

screen.



     "See, this next piece of mail is from Vancouver, Washington."  I typed

LIST 1.  "Here it comes -- right through those phone lines and into the memory

of this machine!"



     The cop scowled.  "How long you planning to be out here?"



     "I'm almost done.  If anyone wants to use the phone, I'll be happy to log

off..."



     "Who pays for this?"



     "Whoever uses it.  You pay an hourly connect rate, plus any applicable

line charges."



     He stared at me long and hard.  I stared back.  "Alright," he finally

said, and turned without a smile.



     You just can't be too careful when a bearded nomad from the north shows up

in town riding some kinda crazy thingamajig with computers on it.  We gotta

protect our citizens!