Listening To The Voices In My Motorbike

 I did the thing I really do not like to do the other day, I sat on my motorbike for a very long day. The bike was moving most of the time, so it wasn’t like I was just sitting in the garage listening to the infotainment and talking on the telephone. I could have done that but would have liked that less.

 It was early morning when I pulled out of Alturas California. It was so early that the dash lights were on, and they stayed on for quite a while.

North bound on 395 out of Alturas is mainly grassland. I was aware that there could be suicidal deer around, but with the motorbikes three LSD lights, I could really see pretty well. Better with the spots on than with just the high beam. Its best not to get ahead of your light so cruising around 50 mph, gave me time to figure out how to close the flipping vents on the lowers.

Aboot the time the dash lights went dark I started to smell Lake Abert. I could tell by the smell and the terrain that Abert must be a Alkali lake. Then Raven with a skull and crossbones tattoo confirmed that this was a dangerous place.

Descending on the narrow, rough road to the north lake shore, was the largest flock of birds I have seen in the lower 48. They stretched for miles, but I only saw them from the road and the bike said nothing aboot who they were.

 It was still early, and I was just rolling along, thinking aboot going back to lake Abert some day and finding out just who sits on the water. It was so pleasant here. I don’t think all morning I had a car behind me, and then I slowed down for Lakeview Oregon.

Lakeview is a cute little town. Might even be a nice place to stop. But nothing sez we support mass shootings and any old kind of gun violence, like the image of a lunatic with a weapon on the Safeway sign.

Hours more of gas and go, is what the rest of the day was. Up and down the topography of 395 through Oregon. At some point we crossed the 45 parallel. The bike said nothing, and I was glad we were only going to Spokane and not the North Pole.

The last gas stop in Oregon was not self-service. The attendant was a very large girl, whose  legs were wider than my motor bike. She let me pump my gas, and then sat down to her sugar drink and filter-tipped cigarette. I wished her well as I pulled out towards the wheat fields of Washington.

The wheat had been cut in all the miles of fields near Colfax, and Sprague.  Navigation was locked into Spokane and the voice occasionally said turn right or keep left. No way could the voice know it was taking me to a parking spot with fresh oil on the ground, and when my foot danced on it, and we stood still for a second before the jiffy stand went down, and I shut down the engine, switch off and the LSD lights went off, security system blinked the lights, and the day was done…

Parked