Motomynd: When in doubt hit the throttle and hang on

Photo just for thematic decoration,
not Motomynd's actual shortcut

On randomness and natural selection: The brain ages, our thinking allegedly evolves, but do we really learn?
    Back in my high school and college days, we had a favorite out-in-the-country place to hang out. It was a BYOB semi-private cabin where people went allegedly to meet compatible people of the opposite sex. In reality it was mostly a place to party, drink too much, and on a too-regular basis to get into a fight. And on very rare occasions to actually meet someone of the opposite sex who was worth spending time with. You know how it is in the 16-22 age group; does anything really make sense?
    One friend was infamous for literally drinking himself under the table. He would show up on his motorcycle with a six-pack and a bottle in his backpack, drink for a while, then curl up under the rustic table in front of the fireplace in the main room and go to sleep. When it came time for us to either leave willingly or be thrown out, we would wake him up, help him get to his bike, get it started, and give him a push. He couldn't walk on his own, mind you, but when he got rolling he could ride that bike home no matter how sleepy or drunk.
    Amazingly, even though he did this for several years, our friend only had one mishap. There was one left turn on his way home, and at three in the morning, just one time, a car happened to be coming the other way as he approached the turn. He had to stop and he toppled over into the roadside ditch. We came along an hour or so later, saw him there, and feared he was dead. No, he was just sleeping. So we woke him up, got him on his bike, got it running, wished him well, and gave him a push toward home. Then we turned the other way and headed home ourselves.
    This sounds horribly insensitive and even inhumane by today's enlightened standards, but that is just the way things were back then. That was an era, after all, in which we would pack a dozen people into the back of an open pickup so we could all afford to drive across town and go to a drive-in or a race at the fairgrounds. Try putting that many people in the back of an open pick up today and see how far you get before flashing lights show up behind you. Yes, times have changed. No one today would dare act in such an unenlightened or ignorant manner.

Or so I thought, until I rode my motorcycle from home in Roanoke, Virginia to my house in Chapel Hill, North Carolina this weekend and had a vertigo attack on the way. Vertigo is nothing new to me: I used to race mountain bikes (the kind you have to pedal) all over the country and rock climb and such until a head injury and recurring vertigo forced me into milder pursuits. With it mostly in remission I got back on a motorcycle last year for the first time in three decades after promising my wife I would be careful. As in, I would stop and call her for a ride if I got dizzy. I even told her about my friend who used to drink himself under the table then ride home and assured her that I would not do anything like that. My wife, being nearly two decades younger than I, and being from more of a country-club than a fight-club upbringing besides, could make no sense of why people would have gone to such a place in the first place, much less put a drunk friend on his bike and give him a send-off.

So, yesterday, I got up with a headache from too much loud music at an event I was photographing the night before, decided to do the 140-mile commute on the motorcycle instead of in a car—despite the ringing in my ears and mild dizziness—and sure enough, half way to North Carolina I realized I was struggling to keep the horizon level. And I noticed this while doing 70 miles per hour and battling wind gusts on the U.S. 220/58 bypass around Martinsville. Which is not the best idea to begin with since my moto is a small sport bike set up for racing and weighs barely 300 pounds. Since I don't weigh much over 150, as a package we are fodder for turbulence and being blown around like the proverbial kite.
    So what to do? Simple, just stop and call my wife, right? Oh, if it really were only that simple. Even I was shocked to find that a brain under siege, trapped in the head of someone eligible for AARP membership, reacts exactly like the brain of a drunk 20-year-old. Eyeing the several-inch drop from pavement to gravel shoulder, I reasoned that if I pulled over I would most likely also fall over. So, the brain under siege reasoned, better to keep rolling, but at least I slowed down to 60 or so.
    After merging onto 58 there were several paved parking lots where I could pull over, but the brain reasoned that if we could just get closer to North Carolina, my wife would not have to drive so far. Then there was the place I usually stop for gas in a car, but I didn't want to stop there and risk falling over and embarrassing myself in front of people I knew. Finally, I was on the 58 bypass around Danville and there was an excellent exit basically in the middle of nowhere. I pulled over there.
    And no, I did not fall over. And yes, I did call my wife. And...and...I told her I was running late because the turbulence from the wind was a struggle and I was a "little dizzy from a migraine." Immediately her voice took on a tone that only a redhead can muster: "Don't lie to me. Are you having a vertigo attack?" My answer? "Well, not exactly a vertigo attack, but I do have a migraine. And I am a little dizzy."
    After a few moments of back and forth I was back on the bike and heading toward Chapel Hill, dizzy from my headache but no vertigo. I can assure you of that.
    When I hit my favorite back-road shortcut, I was even able to lay the bike into some turns and make up some lost time. When I pulled into the driveway my wife said, "You must be feeling better. I could hear you hitting the throttle going into those last turns and I heard you downshifting coming out of them."
    Leaning casually against the deck railing so I wouldn't risk falling down now that I was off the bike, I said, "See, I told you I was just a little dizzy. No vertigo. Did you really think I would be dumb enough to ride if I felt that bad?"