Harley made the Sportster from 1957 to 2021, at which point they redesigned it, keeping the name for an utterly different bike. The old school Sportster ain’t particularly fast and don’t handle particularly astoundingly, but it’s basic and mechanical, in that, an honest machine. It is the motorcycle I dreamed of as a kid, and the Harley to which I always return.
I bought a used Sportster and rode it out to LA in October, 2021 (a ride taken largely through miserably cold and impenetrable fog). Upon arrival I immediately decided that the quiet exhaust pipes had to be replaced with a contraption called the Sawicki Speed Cannon, a set of handmade pipes so loud that they set off cars alarms up and down the avenue, and so low that they drag in the turns, ultmately smashing loose from the bike.
Richelle simply asked “Why?“
What could I say but “Honey, these are bodacious!”
The rationale sounded lame, even to me.
Today, after breakfast at the local hot spot for retired old men limping their walkers towards oblivion, I took the Sportster in to Glendale to get the originals put back on. They drag a bit too, but they don’t cause civil unrest.
The rest of the day has been filled with Zoom calls for work.
I am chair of the Department of English at the University of Colorado Boulder. Much of this trip is about getting away from the duties of the chair, but one universal truth of unit management is that if you get too far away from the unit, it will indeed get away from you. So I got on Zoom.
After five hours of the business, I can honestly, say, I love my job.
Zoom calls don’t produce as cool pictures as motorcycles—at least in my opinion—but my meetings today were pretty fascinating: I met to help design a conference on Technology and Mythology, to discuss the teaching of writing, to brainstorm grant opportunities with a scholar of Palestinian literature, to refine the department’s donor management process, and, finally, to check in on a personnel case. Each of the meetings were intellectual, educational, and deeply human.
Beats getting peppered by hail at 75mph.
That hits on one of the reasons I like to ride 700 mile days: being peppered by hail and then slow-roasted in the Nevada desert makes me appreciate the whole spectrum, the brightness of Little Man’s scruffy coat, the dynamics of the “Gingerfoot,” the excitement of a Palestinian curriculum grant.
All that, except I’m done with the Speed Cannon.
I have to admit a miscalculation on that one.
Onwards! 