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BJ and Hildia meet Sportscaster and motorcycle enthusiast Dave DeSpain at Bristol Motor Speedway Tennessee is a motorcycle Friendly State. I-40 West entering Memphis.

Back In The Saddle Again

Due to a recent illness I had not ridden my motorcycle in nine weeks. In fact I had stored it for the winter thinking I wouldn't be able to ride again before next spring. But my recovery went a lot better than the Doc had predicted and I was released with no restrictions eight weeks after surgery. I went straight home, uncovered the bike, unplugged the battery tender, geared up and took off. 

But Sugar Booger wasn't so sure that old sawbones hadn't released me a bit too early and she refused to ride with me until I put a little more distance between myself and the scalpel. She fully realized that the Gold Wing is a heavy motorcycle by itself and she just didn't think I was quite ready for riding two-up. She was truly concerned and rightly so I guess because I had lost a lot of weight over the past few weeks and to be quite honest, I wasn't the man I used to be. Not yet anyway. I appreciated her concern but personally I thought would do just fine. 

A couple weeks later, still biding her time and fussing over me like Florence Nightingale, we sat at the kitchen table having our morning cup of coffee when she inadvertently opened the "two-up" door by mentioning that it was just to pretty to sit around the house all day. I agreed then seized the moment by suggesting that we fire up the bike and take a ride. I pointed out that the fall foliage was almost at peak, something she normally can't resist. We might not get another chance this year I reasoned. 

Caught off guard, Sugar Booger stammered and stuttered then finally gave in but only if I promised that I would turn around and hi-tail it back to the house if I had problems handling the bike. She proposed that we ride somewhere close by that wouldn't require a lot of maneuvering and handling so I suggested the Catfish Hotel up on the Tennessee River, roughly two-hundred miles round trip. All we had to do I argued was hit US 64 then take a right on highway twenty-two and a left at the Catfish Hotel sign. Piece 'a cake I assured her. Not as close by as she had envisioned but close enough.

The Catfish Hotel sits on the banks of the Tennessee River snuggled right up against Shiloh National Battlefield. Back in 1825, Henry Hagy and his wife docked their flat boat here and laid claim to several acres of bottom land. Later, their son John built a rough log shack next to the river to store stuff that was gonna' be shipped by steamboat. Hagy became well known for his catfish, hushpuppies and tall tales and guests often spent the night thus the nickname "Catfish Hotel". The food and hospitality is still top shelf to this day and we gladly ride the two-hundred miles to have dinner there. 

US 64, a recently four-laned thoroughfare, ain't the best motorcycling road around this neck of the woods so there wouldn't be any yankin' and bankin' but it was better than not riding at all. Heck, I was so fired up to be back in the saddle I-40 would have been a treat for me. And it was a perfect day for riding too. Seventy-two degrees and not a cloud in the sky.

We quickly geared up, well at least Sugar Booger did. I had lost so much weight nothing fit me anymore. I had to take my belt out to the garage and poke a couple more holes in it and even then I still had to break out an old pair of suspenders for backup. And my motorcycle boots felt so heavy I could hardly lift my feet off the floor and went clomping around the house like Frankenstein. Well, I may not be as pretty as I used to be but I was so happy to be crawling back on the motorcycle I just flat wouldn't gonna' let it bother me. 

We boarded the bike, and that's what you do on a Gold Wing, you board it. You don't just bop out into the garage, hop on and take off. This is not some little namby-pamby two cylinder run about. No sir. This is a man's motorcycle and you better be a man if you plan on riding anywhere other than in a straight line. And when you're driveway has a cedar tree blocking your view to the left and a stop sign twenty feet to the right you need to be on your toes 'cause when this baby starts going down Superman hisself' couldn't hang on to it. So right out of the gate I had a tricky maneuver to deal with but all went well and we were off. 

I won't bore you with the ride up. It was uneventful. But at the restaurant it was a different story. Under doctor's orders I was forbidden to eat beef, pork or fried food. I think the Doc, who hails from India, is practicing his religion on me because here in the south if you don't eat beef, pork and fried food you'll starve to death. And I couldn't cheat, not with Florence Nightingale looking over my shoulder. So I got stuck with a salad (Pa-tooie) while she wolfed down a double order of frog legs, two bowls of fried okra and about fifteen hushpuppies. Sometimes life just ain't fair. 

After dinner we took our coffee out on the porch and enjoyed the view of the Tennessee River. Every now and then a tow-boat or cabin cruiser would slowly make its way around the bend. Just around that bend and out of sight was Pittsburg Landing where, during the battle of Shiloh, the Yankees jumped off the bluff into the river as they scrambled to put some distance between them and the boys in butternut during the early stages of the battle. Yeah, I know, the south eventually lost that fight but only after Grant snuck in reinforcements during the night. 

After leaving the restaurant we rode over to the battlefield and looked around for a spell. You can stop and stroll the hills and hollers if you want or you can roam the extensive paved roads on your motorcycle. It's so peaceful and quiet its hard to imagine the horror that took place here so many years ago. All total there were a hundred thousand troops involved and when the two day battle was over, twenty four thousand Americans, blue and gray, were dead or wounded. One of the bloodiest conflicts in American history. 

We rolled out of the park onto Highway 22, picked up US 64 and pointed the headlight west. US 64, as I mentioned earlier, is almost straight as a ruler and having recently been four laned and the fresh asphalt delivered a butter smooth ride. As we rolled through Adamsville, home town of legendary Sheriff Buford Pusser, the sun exploded with every color in the rainbow as it slowly sank below the horizon. Magnificent! 

What a special day. But after my recent brush with cancer, every day is now special, every sunset more brilliant, every blade of grass greener and this normally straight and boring highway more interesting. And I can't think of anyplace I'd rather be than on this motorcycle with my wife and even with mortality staring me in the face, I wouldn't trade places with anybody on God's green earth. 

Life is good. 

bj max

This article was originally published in Minnesota Motorcycle Monthly, Issue #135, Winter 2011

BJ & Ron Ayres, author of Against the Wind, Madison, AL