Just taking a break in between dye jobs on a Saturday afternoon at the Abbey and thought I should snap a shot of my sidecar rig, Boris. Pictured here with his older, feistier, sibling my BMW, Natasha. She is way over due to get started and have the carbon blown out of her carbs so here they both are in the loading docks.

The day I met Boris.

This morning, as I fired up the cantankerous, vintage Russian motorcycle I call “Boris”*, it occurred to me that I have yet to tell the tale of how I came to be the owner of a big, black side car equipped motorcycle.

It was the dawn of the new millennium and I, like most of my tech savvy peers, were making way too much money in this thing they dubbed, “the digital economy”. Printing money from thin air, if you could spell HTML some high tech start up would hire you, offer you an outrageous salary and promise you stock options, riches like you would not believe. Sites (many now long dead) were turning twenty-somethings into millionaires overnight and in the middle of all this madness, your humble narrator was smack dab in the middle and about to turn the bit THREE OH.

I figured I would reward myself, most of my friends at the time were buying sailboats, luxury SUVs and townhouses downtown, so why not? I’ve always wanted a BIG Harley as long as I can remember. Something about those big, black beasts that makes my spine tingle. I figured I deserved it. Up to this point, Tambo and I had always lived simply, still in that “starving college student” mindset, we shied away from converting our new found, post college wealth into big cars and such, opting rather to stash it away in case of a rainy day.

So after a quick call to our bank, an overly enthusiastic banker handed me a letter that said, in effect, “This man can write a check for any motorcycle he wants up to 25K and we guarantee that it will be good” After doing some research, I knew just what I wanted. Make, model, and color… this bad boy was not gonna be cheap either. One Friday, a week before my birthday, Tambo and I escaped work early and went done to the local dealership and were promptly ignored.

Yep, there we stood, with letter of guaranteed funds in hand and we could not get the time of day from any of the staff. After nearly accosting a sales person with threats of bodily harm, I explained what I was looking for and was told, get this, “sorry you can’t have that” Jaws agape, we stared at this man as he calmly explained that no, IF we wanted to drop over 20K today, we would have to pick a model from what they have enroute from the factory, that is IF there were any we liked and MAYBE we would get said substitute bike by Christmas.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but regardless of how much money a person spends, customer service goes a long way and if that somebody is about to drop tens of thousands of dollars, said customer service better damn well not include the word “no”

Disgusted, we left the dealership never to return. “I wanna ride a motorcycle, not a bandwagon” I told them as I left. Tambo, the ever calm one, asked me “well, are there any other makes you had your eye on?”
Well… there are these crazy retro bikes made in Russia that come with sidecars…

A few calls later and we had a date to go try one out. The nearest dealership was almost 2 hours drive away so Tambo and I made a day of it. Packed our riding gear up and headed out to what turned out to be a converted barn on the edge of where urban sprawl met farmland. The dealer? A smiling old guy who had not one, not two but three bikes sitting, warmed up and waiting for me. I’ve ridden sidecar bikes before so after a quick lesson on some of the specifics of these models, Tambo and I piled into one and took off in the direction he recommended.

“Lots of pretty pastures out that way..” he waved.

The bike did not roar and throb, rather it sounded like a rather large sewing machine as we hummed along the country road. Sure it was black and had some cool retro chrome, it was far from a big beast of a machine. That and there was this sound I kept hearing as we passed bemused looking cattle grazing in the sun. It was the sound of laughter. Tambo and I were laughing like a couple of giddy school kids as we roared down the open road together. Pulling over and removing our helmets we both had what must have been the biggest, goofiest grins on our faces.

I wanted one, but with a few additions. Upon returning, said requested additions were met with “sure, no problem. How does next week work for you?” and a price tag that was shockingly less than I was expecting to pay.

Next week, being my birthday was met with some technical crisis that forced both Tambo and I to log unimaginable hours at work. Not only would it look like I would be forced to work on my birthday, but I would not be getting to make the trip out to the dealership that week to pick-up my shiny new bike. “Not a problem” said the dealer, and what do you think he did? He puts the bike on a truck, makes the 2 hour trek and delivered the bike to my office on my birthday.

Today, Boris sits just outside where I type this. The years, they have started to take their toll on the old boy. His chrome is not so shiny and the tell tale spots of rust are beginning to show, but I still get that stupid grin every time I throw a leg over and fire up the old beast.

That cantankerous old sob still makes Tambo and I laugh like school kids every time.

*In Russia it is customary to name vehicles; ships etc with masculine identities, as opposed to the west were we tend to refer to them in the feminine form. The name “Boris” came to me because in my mind the bike would talk like a rotund cab driver, jovial but nobody’s fool. “Boris have one speed, Boris’ speed. If Boris want to go up hill fast, we go fast but don’t push it babushka”

First thing’s first (hence why they call it the ‘first thing’) – this isn’t Monk. The Twisted Monk blog has become the unofficial fifteen-minute domain of me, Alex, the fourteenth- or fifteenth-coolest person in the greater Seattle area.

Why, you may be asking yourselves as you sip your lattes and muse upon life, is Alex invading Monk’s personal private blather-space? Because, ladies, gentlemen, and everything in between, I am possessed of two fully functional typing hands and a head clear of powerful painkillers – commodities that my dear Daddy is not possessed of at this particular moment.

I hope you’re in a comfortable, seated position, cause now I’m gonna tell you how it all went down.

Monk. Then Alex. Then the BMW. That is, quite literally, how it all went down.

Before you all start panicking and bolting like so many wide-eyed gazelles, let me assure you that we’re both still very much alive. (Oh, don’t look so disappointed.) The crash – it barely warrants the term, but it sounds so dramatic that I can’t resist – happened yesterday (Sunday) afternoon, and was the result of a very low-speed pop of front tire against protesting railroad track. Monk went over the front, I went off the side, and we hit the street like a couple of heavily-armored sacks of rock salt.

Note: heavily-armored. We were both donning full protective gear – leathers, boots, and full-face helmets. Had either of us not been, we might be sporting anything from facial road rash to skull fractures to broken backs. I for one skidded a good two feet on the side of my head; that’s enough to mess with anyone’s moneymaker. Message to the masses #1: wear your fucking gear when you ride.

Anyway, where was I? Ah, yes, we came off the bike. We both bounced up pretty quickly, exchanged “Are you OK”s, and Monk went to gather up the toppled bike. It was right around the time when he tried to lift the thing that we realized something was amiss in the vicinity of his right shoulder – a very important something that made him curse like a sailor when it was touched, and crackled like Pop-Rocks under my fingers.

I think at that point we both said, “Oh, shit.”

We paid Tambo the phone call that every motorcyclist’s spouse dreads, and she came running to gather us up and take us to the nearest ER. It took about an hour for the doctors to get their rears in gear, take Monk back, dope him, X-ray him, and declare that sure ‘nuff, sir, you’ve got yourself a broken collarbone.

I think at that point, all three of us said, “Oh, shit.”

(By the way, if you’re wondering after my so-called welfare, which I am one-hundred-percent certain you’re not, I came out of the crash with no worse than a couple of bruises. The clear explanation for my lack of injury is that I am, in fact, a ninja. Or Bruce Willis in ‘Unbreakable.’)

Monk got his arm stuffed in a sling, got a few more well-warranted painkillers slipped into his bloodstream, and we all three got sent on our way with the healing instructions from hell: don’t use your right arm for six weeks.

Telling an ordinary paper-pusher not to use his right arm for six weeks is liable to get you a hissy fit. Telling Twisted Monk not to use his right arm for six weeks is like instructing Seattle clouds not to dump rain on us for six weeks, or informing the aforementioned paper-pusher that he’s not allowed to drink coffee for the rest of his life – in other words, are you for fucking real?

We keep saying “It could be worse,” because it really could be. I don’t even want to know the statistics for crippling or fatal motorcycle accidents, because knowing them will scare the bejeezus out of me. Monk may be sedated and bandaged, sleeping on the futon in an uncomfortable propped-up position, but he’s alive, and he can walk, talk, and he still flips me the bird when I get on his nerves. Six weeks without the use of an arm is a long time – but it could well have been the rest of his life if the cards had fallen differently.

A lot of things are still up in the air for us at the moment, but we’re doing our best to bring them down to earth as quickly and efficiently as we can. I can speak for the integrity and commitment of Monk’s support network, and not just because I happen to be a part of it – because I’ve seen it in action before, and it absolutely astounds me to watch everyone spring to his aid when he needs you most. I say ‘you’ because I know who’s reading this – friends, family, customers, and, in short, people who matter in Monk’s world. Telling you about this isn’t meant to scare you or set you off – you’re told because you deserve to know, and because you can handle it. Getting through this will be tough, but we’re fucking tough, so I know we can do it.

Monk’s got some mighty big boots, and I know we can’t expect to fill them completely – but we can keep them polished nice and shiny for six weeks, so that they’re ready to wear as soon as he’s ready to step back into them.

Naming

The new motorcycle finally roared to life for me on Friday. After several days of frustration and just never enough time to really sit down and undo the damage from years of non-use, late Friday afternoon she came to life. While I still have dozens of hours of work left to do before she will ever see the open road, I was rewarded with the sounds of her throaty purr.

Yes, I’m referring to my bike as a woman.

My other bike, a vintage Russian bike with a sidecar, is definitely male. It took me a while to find his name, to feel out the personality of the machine as it were, but I call him “Boris”. The machine is beautiful and fun to ride, but lets face it. Pulling a sidecar is not the sexiest of jobs. Rather, Boris is strong and loyal. A great lumbering bear of a machine, hard working and able to stand up to just about anything you throw at him.. save a very steep hill. If Boris could talk, he would sound like a thickly accented cab driver. “Boris have one speed, Boris' speed. If Boris not want to go up hill? Boris no go up hill.”

Now the BMW, this one is different. I knew for sure that this bike would definitely be female, but what kind of female? Once I heard the engine explode into life I knew that this girl was going to be a handful, a proud and high maintenance ride that was not to be trifled with. Her voice, the low growl of her exhaust, sounds like a mix of whiskey and cigarttes. A grand seductress that will certainly cause me many hours of frustration, but oh when she wants to, she will be better than any lover. Yep, a grand Teutonic bitch queen. Strong, proud and loud.


*EDIT* I was going to name the bike after a character in a 70's exploitation film, a terribly bad film in that cheesy sort of "oh my god this is SO over the top" sort of way. However it has been pointed out to me that the character was based on an actual person. Not a good person either. I can't in good faith go with that name now. It just feels wrong to me. Alas, I shall have to go back to the drawing board with this one.

How to not (emotionally) slam into a (relationship) guardrail

There is a concept they teach you when riding a motorcycle called “Target Fixation”, understanding this can save your life. See, when you are swerving to avoid something or taking an overly sharp corner, your natural instinct is to focus on the thing you are trying to avoid. However by doing this you are not going to avoid said thing, instead you are going to slam right the fuck into it. Instead, they tell you to look not at the thing you want to avoid but rather look in the direction of where you want to be… and the bike will follow.

I like to apply this rule to my poly. For me it is far too easy to focus on the thing that I fear the most. For example, one of my constant fears is that by having so many things and people all vying for my time and attention that I am constantly short changing one or all of my partners at any given time. This fear can drive me to exhaustion as I work to second guess what they might be lacking from me or seek reassurance from them that they are feeling fully loved and cherished by me. In doing so I also drive them (and myself) insane. Thing is, if you focus too much time and attention on the thing you are trying most to avoid, you will make it come true. It is sorta like saying, “Whatever you do, don’t think about bananas”. What happens? All you can now think about are those damned bananas.

Meanwhile back at the motorcycle metaphor, how do you avoid becoming a grease stain on that jersey barrier then? Look through the turn to where you need to be in order to avoid the collision. For me that means, and I have to remind myself of this often, that rather than focus on the “oh fuck, I’m short changing my partners!” I ask myself, “am I fully present and enjoying the time I am blessed to have with them?” This means not dragging shop drama home and making it the focus of the date. Sure it is one thing to talk about the stresses of the day, it is another to let them ruin the few precious hours you have with someone you love. Don’t obsess over what things my over active sense of guilt might want to convince me that I am not doing for them and realistically assess what time and energy I can give and give it, even if it is less time than you would like, fully.

It also means that when they tell you, that even though you are currently a stress monkey and not the most entertaining of partners to have around, they still love you.

You trust them.