Learnign to Fly

Having spent most of the useful work day laid out on my sofa, looped-out on double-dosed antihistamines, with ice packs on my swollen eyes, I did manage to wander into the office this afternoon at the crack O'3. The likely-lucrative mediation on Tuesday called for some special attention today. So, I carefully meandered my way in to downtown.

I worked quickly with surprising efficiency, crunching numbers and reading medical records. I stopped only for a few convulsive sneezing fits, which I combated with more allergy eye drops and pills. By 7:00, I was done with my work and felt pharmaceutically mellow. It was time to head home.

It was a well-lit late-evening commute. Traffic was swift, and the sun spread golden light across the valley. All of the gray, which had turned green over the weekend, reflected the low-lying sunlight in a dazzling spectacle of color.

I exited the freeway and made the familiar pattern of turns that lead to my house. As I came around a wide bend, I spied two boys on bikes, riding toward me on the sidewalk to my right.

The first boy dipped down into a driveway, and my eyes followed his path. Suddenly, reflexively, as he reached the upward concrete lip, my arms flexed and my forward foot pulsed.

I saw that his arms and legs did the same thing, and the front tire of his bike gained altitude, if only for a second, and the rest of his bike followed the same trajectory toward the sky.

Like lightning, and clear as day, my mind flashed to 1981. It was a hot summer day. I was riding my red Kent BMX bike with yellow pads down the street toward my friend's house. (No helmet, of course!) I was bored and looking for something to do. I, however, had no idea what was brewing at the far end of the street.

For years, the other boys and I had been building bike ramps, each increasing in height and risk as we got older. Apparently, the tire and railroad-tie construction from when we were 9 had become passe. Now at 10, we were going to ramp it up a notch, so to speak...

Tommy and David (Not to be confused with Drunken Ramblers, Tom and Dave) had been busy prior to my arrival. What met me, as I skidded to a distracted halt, was an engineering monstrosity. Wooden crates, 2X4s, tires, buckets, and duct tape held together a magnificent skeletal frame, which supported a lengthy 2-inch plank, placed atop as a ramp.

The apex of the thing reached approximately 4 feet off the ground.

Now, here is the genius: someone, exercising some degree of common sense, had realized that any jump from that ramp, and the resulting gain of vertical elevation, combined with the force of forward momentum, would cause dire consequences upon descent. Despite all else, you have to admire that guy's singular ability to think ahead.

However, that is as far as the logic went.

The "safety" precautions thus taken entailed moving the ramp to the base of the driveway, pointed upward at an angle, leading a jumper from the street, up the ramp and into the safety of the soft grass in the front yard. The utilization of the driveway, of course, added an extra 8 vertical inches to the whole thing.

Oh, and did I mention the tree?

It was a mature sycamore, and its branches overhung most of the yard. Following simple euclidean geometry, it was clear to see that the leafy branches lie directly in the path of the ramp.

A discussion was held. A conference. And it was determined that the tree branches would be useful in breaking the fall. Essentially, we would ride like hell down the street and up the ramp, launching with the maximum velocity our short-cranked single-geared rigs would produce. We would fly up into the soft arms of the Sycamore, and then drop onto the pillow-like lawn below.

It made sense.

I was by no means brave enough to go first, and watched as my pal essentially succeeded on the very first try. Of course, the trees arms weren't soft, and the ground below the grass was a hardened clay. Nevertheless, the fearless pioneer pulled him self up from the ground bruised, ripped, scraped and bloody, but grinning ear-to-ear.

We each, then, took our obligatory turns. I somehow missed the tree altogether on my first attempt. I suspect it would have been better to hit the tree... We all then made a second, machismo-proving second jump, and called it quits for the day.

On that old beat up bike, though, I never missed an opportunity to hit a jump, and caught air whenever I could, just as that boy did today. Maybe it is a universal thing. Maybe all boys of a certain age feel the need to fly, if only for a second.

Maybe girls do it too. I don't know, I was never a girl.