Wrong way on the Interstate
My mother moved back to Kentucky from Ohio in the late seventies. One weekend, I decided to ride down and see her. The ride from Xenia, OH to Salyersville, KY would usually take a little over four hours. Crazy Cyde and the Northridge boys decided they'd ride down with me, so I rode to North Dayton to Clyde's house to join up on Friday afternoon.
Clyde's garage was a hangout for bikers. There were always plenty of refreshments, music and something for the head. Tools and motorcycle parts hung from the walls and a plastic anti-freeze bottle, with the bottom cut out, was nailed upside down on the back wall and served as a urinal. A hose ran from it's bottom through a hole in the wall to a pot plant planted behind the garage. That afternoon was spent with the boys wrenching their motorcycles into road worthiness,, all while self medicating ourselves prior to departure.
It was late afternoon when seven or eight of us headed south on I-75 towards Kentucky, with me in the lead setting a brisk pace. A few miles south of Dayton, I realized that I couldn't see any of them in my mirror, so I slowed down. Me running off and leaving people is a problem that I still have, yet today. I slowed the shovel and kept looking in my mirror hoping that the pack would soon materialize in it's reflection. Finally, I pulled the motorcycle over to the side of the road and up on the bern.
Lighting a cigarette, I sat down on the guardrail gazing northward into the oncoming traffic anticipating the boys rolling over the hill at any moment. When enough time had passed to convince me something was wrong, I kicked the shovel back into life, turned it to the north and rode slowly up the bern. "Perhaps they were off the road just over the hill," I thought. That's when I saw the State cop heading north from across the median.
The OHP hit his brakes and made a U-turn in the service crossover lane just up the road from me. Heading back towards me in the southbound lane, he lit up the cherries on top of the cruiser and pulled up in front of me on the bern. After getting out of the car, he walked up to me and said, "Just what do you think you're doing?" I told him about my friends that had been following me and how I'd seemed to have lost them and was just slowly cruising up the bern in hopes of finding them. He wasn't amused. A moment later, Clyde's brother in law, Barry...pulled up on his Triumph chopper. He told us that Hippie Bob had broken down and that they were heading back to Northridge, then he rode back.
That left me to deal with the trooper. It was apparent that there was something about me that he just didn't like. He asked, "Where are you headed?" "To eastern Kentucky to see my mother," I said. "Are you married?" he further probed. "Yes, I am," said I. "What does she think about you just riding off on this here motorcycle for the weekend?" he wanted to know. "I didn't really ask her," I answered. He really seemed to enjoy messing with a long haired hippy biker on a chop. Kinda like the highlight of his day, or somethin'. He said couldn't treat me special, 'cause I was from another county. He looked at me like I was from another planet.
I was growing a little nervous as I could see that he was enjoying toying with me. That, and the fact that we had already started Happy Hour back at Clyde's and the bags on the motorcycle, concealed substances of dubious legality as well as a loaded Colt pistol, heightened the anxiety of the moment.
Finally tiring of badgering me, he told me that he was going to write me a ticket for going the, "Wrong way on the Interstate." He smiled and said, "We can run down to station off the next exit and pay it, if you like." I thought, "Might as well," ..kicked the bike back into life and followed him down the highway.
We arrived at the station, went in and walked up to the counter. The lady behind the protective glass gazed expressionlessly at us both as the trooper laid his clipboard on th
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