\nIt was getting late in the day. Over the past several days when lacing \nmy boots I’d noticed that one of the laces was beginning to fray. I’d \ntold myself that I needed to get new strings, maybe this time two pair \nso I’d have one in reserve. I had put it off and I had put it off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well\n it was late in the day, I was alone and nothing was holding me down. \nPerhaps it was a good time to run up to Walmart and get the needed boot \nlaces. The bike was already sitting outside the garage door awaiting \nits being put away for the night. It was a nice evening. Temperatures \nwere falling off a bit, the air was refreshing, and traffic was light. I\n do love to hear the pipes sing. On the way to the store I was thinking\n of my bragging recently that I couldn’t take this bike anywhere without\n someone wanting to talk about her. Perhaps I overstated but there were\n times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I rolled into the Walmart parking lot and was surprised \nat how empty it seemed. Normally I would turn across the front of the \nstore and ride back out one of the rows to see where the right parking \nspot was available. I did anyway but the lot was wide open. The \nWalmart has two entryways. The near leads into the old style Walmart \nfare and the further one into the grocery half. I always tend to park \nnear the first entrance and did again, nothing much was around my \nspace. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I was removing gear and preparing to dismount I \nnoticed two young ladies (I’m sixty-nine. They’re all young.) walking \ntoward the door. They were addressed by a man walking with his wife \nobviously from the far doors. “That one’s closed. The other one is \nopen. Better hurry. They close at eight thirty.” Eight thirty!? What\n has this panic done to us? How does closing the Walmart, normally \ntwenty-four hour, at eight thirty make any sense? The two girls broke \ninto a run toward the far doors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I checked my watch. Yep, it was\n indeed closing on eight thirty. I began my trek across the parking lot\n to the grocery doors. I approached the doors where they had the near \nside taped off encouraging people to walk on past some twenty-five feet \nto line up for entrance. No one was in line but there was a Walmart \nlady with a watch just outside the door. “You’ve got one minute,” and \nshe passed me through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once inside I could hear the announcements\n for “Get your stuff and proceed to the checkouts.” I hurried back to \nthe shoe section. On the laces rack the pickings were slim. Apparently\n lots of folks were wearing out their laces. The last pair I had \nsettled for were yellow and red sixty-six inches against the black \nboots. I hadn’t liked them but they grew on me. I was looking for the \nsame to replace. There were no yellow and red laces among the sparsely \nhung racks. I’d have to settle for black. There were none of sixty-six\n inches. Maybe that much wasn’t needed. I normally loop the laces \nlarge and tuck the excess in around my boots. There was a black set of \nsixty inches. I had to search a bit to find a second sixty inch set but\n I found them. I took both sets and headed for the register. I took \nthe direct route through the bras and panties. I was in a hurry so I \ndidn’t buy any this time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I exited the doors as the store began \nto look more and more like a deserted place. I began the long walk \nacross the lot. My bike, Daisy Mae, was all alone by now and there was a\n tall young man walking around her. He held his smart phone up high and\n occasionally paused to look more closely at something on the bike. As I\n approached he spoke to me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It’s a very nice bike.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Yes, I like her a bit.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Is\n it alright that I record?” His English was broken but he spoke with a \nheavy accent revealing that English was not his native tongue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Sure. No problem.” (Yes, I know it should have been surely but sometimes it appears that English is not my native tongue.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“What is it?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It’s a Honda, a Valkyrie.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“That’s a big engine.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It’s the same as you’d see on a Goldwing but with six carbs instead of two.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Wow! Six carburetors!” <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It\n has less plastic to show off the engine. It’s sort of a hot rod \nversion of the Goldwing. They made them from nineteen ninety-seven \nuntil two thousand three.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I used to have a motorcycle but not \nas big as that one.” He sorted through pictures on his phone to show me\n a bare v-twin in black.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I like it. It’s stripped down and \nlooks agile. I like that. That what I like about this one. I have \nbikes with bags and fairings but I tend to like this one best.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was mounting up now. He asked if he could hear it run. I agreed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Can I record?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Certainly.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\n pulled the bike off the side stand and started it. He motioned for me \nto rev the engine holding up his phone. I did and was greeted by an \napproving smile. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He walked on toward his car and I rolled out of\n the parking lot. I guess it is true. I can’t take her anywhere \nwithout someone wanting to talk about her. That’s alright with me. I’m\n a bit of an attention whore anyway. \n\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It was getting late in the day. Over the past several days when lacing my boots I’d noticed that one of the laces was beginning to fray. I’d told myself that I needed to get new strings, maybe this time …<\/span> Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-musings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1073"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1073\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1074,"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1073\/revisions\/1074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willowinthewind.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}