Sunday, 24 August, brought a beautiful afternoon to East Kansas. The heavens were a pale blue with a spattering of powder puff clouds drifting west to east across the sky. The day was warm, but not oppressively so. It was a perfect day to ride.

I was one of the last to leave the church parking lot. As I pulled on my padded mesh jacket and half helmet, I smiled, remembering my arrival some three and a half hours earlier. Dave at the door had commented on what a lovely morning it was and I had replied with how difficult it was to pull into the parking lot. It was a near perfect day.

I rolled gently down the hill and into the lane to turn south toward the flyway. I try to be especially gentle with the throttle in the presence of my non-riding friends, most specifically the younger ones. Riding south on Metcalf I was for a time alongside my friend, Diana. She commented later to me that at the stoplight she was noting how I was wearing my helmet, padded jacket, and leather chaps. She thought about how all that protective gear must surely make me most safe on the road.

I turned west onto 435 and allowed myself to feel the exhilaration of the Valkyrie’s acceleration. Traffic was reasonably light and I moved with ease into the leftmost lane. I entertained for just a moment the possibility of taking the long way home, perhaps arriving in an hour or so, but I knew that Lori was preparing a quick lunch as our son would be leaving for work in a short time. I did the responsible thing and chose to go straight home. Perhaps there would be opportunity for a ride later in the day.

I exited just three miles down 435 south onto Quivira. Normally I would have held 435 to I35 South, but there was construction that day on I35 and the road off I35 had been ground to a deeply grooved surface in preparation for repaving. Quivira I followed south to 119th street where I turned again to the west. At Pflumm the cage in front of me caught a red light. We were in the left lane and the right was open. I cleared traffic and moved into the right lane allowing myself to be first off the changing signal.

I was almost in ecstasy. The sun was on my face, a warm summer breeze brushed my cheeks, and I was moving freely in traffic. My nearest fellow travelers on the road were some twenty yards ahead and thirty yards behind me.

I moved into the left lane in preparation for my transition south onto Blackbob road. I was about a mile and a half from home and it was just past one o’clock in the afternoon.

Approaching the last intersection before Blackbob a movement to my left caught my eye. A little blue Ford had rolled into the oncoming left turn lane. I caught my breath as I realized the nose of the cage was not down for the necessary stop. Four words passed rapidly through my mind, whether audibly I do not know.

“Oh, no!” as I realized it was likely the car was not going to stop. Then as I accepted that impact was imminent, a repeat of the, “Oh,” and a meaningless reference to fecal matter.

There was no screech of tires or blaring clarion. I had no time to touch brake or horn. There was only the sickening thud of metal on metal and I was airborne. The bike struck the cage on the passenger door at an angle ever so slightly pointed to the right.

As I rotated through the air I remember very clearly seeing the clouds spinning, but I could not catch sight of the earth. I take that to mean that I was spinning flatly like a poorly shaped Frisbee, But it could have been that my mind simply didn’t register the complexity of the ground view. After what seemed like a long time I landed flat on my back on the pavement. I did not slide. I interpret that to mean that my travel was most primarily vertical.

I sat up for a moment and immediately decided that wasn’t a good idea so I dropped once more to my back and pulled my knees up to relieve the pressure below my waist. During the moment that I was sitting I saw the front of a cage with the doors already open and people running toward me. It seems to me unlikely that it could have happened that quickly, so it is possible that I had passed out for a few seconds following the impact with the ground. If I did, that would be the only time that I was not conscious during the episode.

God’s protective hand was certainly upon me during those few seconds. I suffered injuries both on exiting the bike and on impact with the ground, but not nearly as extensive as might have been. My pelvis was broken and separated in what one would later describe as an open book fracture with a two inch spread. My left thumb was broken at the base and several ribs on my right side were broken in multiple places. I had two rather large bruises on my back, but my spine was apparently well protected by the spine pad in the back of my jacket.

Some may ask that were I protected why was the protection not extended for two seconds to avoid the collision altogether? I don’t know, but I do know that a split second difference would have placed the car into me; a taller cage may have caught my head upon ejection. Things were not nearly as bad as they might have been and the situation as it has unfolded is being used in many ways.

I think I must have had my eyes closed off and on through the remainder of the time on the road. I can recall now and then staring at the sky and I interacted with several people, but I can recall no faces.

I could tell that there were several people moving about me frantically and I could hear a woman wailing from some distance away.

“Has anyone called nine one one?”

“I can’t get through!”

“Can you hear me? Hold on, help is coming.”

“Is there someone we should call? Do you have a cell phone?”

“Yes, my wife. It’s in the right bag.” The phone was actually in the left bag.

“My pelvis! My pelvis! Oh, sh-t! Sh-t! Sh-t! I’m sorry.”

“Is it Lori?”

“Yes.”

I could hear sirens in the distance.

My breathing was shallow. I thought of Steve and how similar this accident was to the one that had taken his life from him just two months prior. I wondered how the family would manage. I was at ease with the possibility of death. I will not say that I embraced the idea, but I was not panicked by it.

“Can you tell me the number to call? We’re getting no answer.”

“Yes,” I recited to him the number of Lori’s cell phone.

Someone was bending over me and asking questions. I do not remember them all.

“Do you know what today is?”

“Sunday, twenty-four August.”

“When were you born?”

Someone was cutting at my jacket.

“Fifteen February, nineteen fifty-one.”

“Can you feel this?”

“Yes.” My answers were getting shorter and softer.

“Can we get his helmet off?” One of them began to fiddle with the chin strap, but obviously wasn’t sure how to loosen it. I reached up to help, but found my hand weaker than I had expected.

“You have to push up on the strap.”

Someone said something about a backboard and neck brace. Hands were attaching things to me.

“On three. One. Two. Three.”

“Oh! Sh-t! Sh-t! Sh-t! I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”

“Yes. Yes, I do.”

“My belt. Can someone loosen my belt?”

“We can’t do that. We don’t know what it’s holding together.”

I felt the catheter going in but it didn’t occur to me then exactly what was happening out there on the pavement. When the catheter passed my prostate I felt what seemed like an erupting fountain. I’m sure that what passed through the tube was a mix of several fluids.

The EMT was on the radio with someone. “I have one yellow, one red, and a green.”

“Am I the yellow?” He wouldn’t answer me.

“Am I in trouble?”

“You? No. You did nothing wrong. You’re not in any trouble.”

“No, that’s not what I mean. Am I in trouble?”

He grasped the meaning of the question. “No, you’re going to be alright. We’re getting you to good help.”

“On three. One. Two. Three.”

“Aaaagh!”

The ambulance driver, I believe was next to the EMT as they loaded me through the rear doors.

“Olathe Medical Center?”

“No! No! Overland Park Regional!” The EMT was quite emphatic. OPRMC was the nearest and best trauma center in the area.

I do not remember details of the ride to Overland Park Regional and I suspect that I was drifting in and out for that time. Once at the hospital I was moved once more with results very similar to the previous relocations. There were X-rays and a cat scan.

Back in the emergency room my breathing had become very shallow and all I could manage was short panting breaths. I looked down once and could clearly see the right side of my chest swollen like an overinflated balloon.

One or two people spoke to me, my pastor and someone else, I believe, and then they were hurried out of the room.

I recall vaguely that the doctor informed me he had an observer with him and asked if it was okay for him to watch. I was in no shape to deny anyone anything. I readily agreed.

“The secret to inserting a chest tube is properly preparing the way with …”

I felt a slight sting as he inserted the needle the first time and then pressure as he worked his way up my chest.

From the moment the doctor inserted the chest tube, things began to get better and my breathing returned to something much more near normal.

The day was finished out with my movement to the Critical Care Unit and a host of visits from my friends and family. Thus began some eighteen days in the hospital, fourteen of which were in the CCU.

Except for a momentary setback after the first week, the healing process progressed better than anyone had a right to expect. Surgery was performed to pin a plate to my pelvis and place two small pins in my thumb. From the morning of the surgery all pain in my pelvic region vanished. The longest and most nagging part of the recovery in the hospital was dealing with the collapsed lung, the pneumothorax.

I have returned home now, or at least near home, to complete a twelve week recuperation period for the healing of the patched pelvis. Almost miraculously, none of my vital organs, save the lung, were damaged. I am thankful that my injuries were as limited as they were considering the situation.

The driver of the Ford told the police officer, “I didn’t see him until he hit me.”

That was predictable on two counts. One is the lack of notice of the motorcycle rider and the other is the automatic assignment of action to the rider.

I have a request of my friends who drive cages. Discipline yourselves to see motorcycles. If you are looking for a bike and your eyes fall upon a four wheeled vehicle, you have no problem. If you are looking specifically for a four wheeled vehicle and your vision picks up a motorcycle, it is likely that your brain will not even register the sight.

One study states, “In the multiple vehicle accidents, the driver of the other vehicle violated the motorcycle right-of-way and caused the accident in two-thirds of those accidents. The failure of motorists to detect and recognize motorcycles in traffic is the predominating cause of motorcycle accidents. The driver of the other vehicle involved in collision with the motorcycle did not see the motorcycle before the collision, or did not see the motorcycle until too late to avoid the collision.”

Don’t be a participant. Discipline yourselves to look for motorcycles. Tell all your friends to do so also.

For the riders I have some advice. Hone your skills. Discipline yourselves to watch for what the cages are going to do. There is enough danger associated with the irrational actions of those who must ride with training wheels. Decide that you will not make it worse by adding your own participation.

For a while after the accident I would have said that there was simply nothing I could do. The cage was too close and the move too late for me to react. In retrospect, I realize that I was not riding entirely as I normally do. In traffic, I normally attempt to place myself next to a cage. In moving through traffic I try to move from cage to cage. The idea is that if someone does not see me that someone will also have to not see the larger vehicle.

That day, the weather was so nice and the ride so pleasant that I was simply enjoying the ride. I had let down my guard. Would it have made a difference? We’ll never know.

Do what it is that you can do. Don’t ride in fear, but do ride in awareness.

You all be safe and I’ll see you down the road.