Kooroocheang and onwards

I've been riding this wonderful bike almost every day. The CB250 Nighthawk is such an unsung hero. I work for myself from home, and most afternoons will go write in a cafe in town (Maryborough) for a couple of hours. Afterwards, I have been a spending a half hour exploring different bush roads on the edge of town as a long way home. Once a week I'll take a longer ride. This week I was greedy and took two such rides. Friday was to Ampitheatre, then south to Beaufort, lunch, north to Bealiba--including some exploring on the dirt--then Dunolly and home. Today I rode west in the Autumn light. I cruised at an easy pace on single lane roads, simply rolling the throttle on and off in top gear, through patches of forest and dale, and always emerging into green farmland. I passed through Smeaton, Clunes for lunch, then through the forests south of Talbot.

I could not bring the ride to an end, so the last hour or two were spend riding forest and farm roads south of Maryborough. It's so good to be on a bike again, and this is Nighthawk is such a simple, reliable, pleasurable choice.

2024 and a New Chapter

We were gathered around a table in the bar of The Clyde, on a warm Carlton afternoon. It was the typical Friday gathering of friends: retired philosophers, some of whom had taught me, and some of whom I had taught alongside. However, we had a lot in common beside philosophy: we were ex-seminarians (or an ex-monk in my case), we were all from working-class families in rural north-western Victoria, and we all loved motorcycles. You have already met Peter Drum on this blog, posing astride his Kawasaki W650...perchance outside The Clyde. He was there. This is me with his Model A on a very, very "drenched" New Year's Eve:

Why is this scene coming to mind now? Because of Brian Scarlett, a particularly fine example of a human being, who has since died. He was talking about when he gave up his BSA motorcycle after a nasty spill. Then he paused, and remembered how his wife had later said: "You know, I think you gave up too much, when you gave up that motorcycle." After a second pause--with both a fear away look and a glint in his eye--he exclaimed "What a paragon of a woman!" We fell into laughter. Brian was a very funny man, and yet those words, "You gave up too much, when you gave up that motorcycle," have in the last year gradually, increasingly slid into my mind's ear. It was from the periphery at first, like a wish for an old lover combined with the happy acceptance that life moves on, but then it became a longing, and eventually an ache. I live at the edge of a country town. A motorcycle would arrive from the highway and pull over, perhaps waiting for friends, and I would stare out the window, my mind lost in its sound. I had given up too much. But of what? The thing, formless, nameless, invisible, but fundamental, alive in the chill winter day of blurred moments of ferns and silver wet roads outside Toolangi. On the coldest days of winter I had those roads to myself, and it felt mystical to be in the silence of that flowing space on two wheels. Or out west, in a wholly different country, the sky blue and sunlit, spreading myself across wheat fields and prehistoric flora as my struggling old bike pushed northwards into the desert. It has been almost a decade since my last post. Naturally much has happened. I will be brief, but will tell you the story in its relevant essentials. From touring 40,000km a year for a decade, heading out every weekend no matter the weather, I had begun to slow down. One morning, commuting through Melbourne, I crashed my W650 in the wet. I was taken to the hospital with severe pain in my neck but was ultimately fine, if very sore for a couple of months. I was also quite shaken by the hours of lying in a ward with questions about my injuries unanswered. Despite the shop repairs, the bike never felt the same. I sold it to a friend. That left me with the Royal Enfield, and I continued my trips around Victoria and Tasmania:

During this time I developed also a strong interest in cycling, riding daily plus taking some long trips, for example from Lancefield to Maldon via those same steep hills on which I loved to motorcycle. I deepened also my interest in electric bicycles, which had begun years before when we still used car batteries, and when lycra cyclists would lose their temper at our existence. Now I had lithium-ion, which could go so far (I always pedal my electric bikes). Below is an English-made Pashley with a 250w mid-drive motor that I fitted. This photo was taken on a trip to Warburton:

Here's a photo from a ride that began at Castlemaine, across to the border with South Australia, and then up to NSW:

I was still playing about with bikes, including borrowing and riding various machines from friends:

However, as I say, I had slowed down in terms of riding. Then came December 2016. While on a motorcycle trip around Tasmania something happened. It was not related to motorcycling, but it shattered me for a time, and became a fulcrum, a turning point which led to much inward and outward change. For one thing, I got out of Melbourne. I had moved to the city at 17 to pursue a career in music, but I grew up in the dust of the Mallee and the mountains of southern Tasmania. My heart has always been in the country and the bush, and I longed to return. So in 2018 I pulled all my money together, and even sold my Royal Enfield, to buy a house in Maryborough, Victoria.

Like many people of my age and inclinations--doing work that puts passion first and pay second--I had despaired of ever buying a home, at least in a place I wanted to live. I had not been saving for a house. It was a sudden decision and a scramble, which became heightened after I signed the contract for the house--subject to bank approval--and the bank went from wanting a 5% deposit to 20%. It cleaned me out. I moved two hours away, with no car and a few hundred dollars to my name. It so happened that the day after the bank required a higher deposit a friend called, asking by chance if I wanted to buy his car. I offered him a payment plan for his station wagon, and it served also as accommodation for the half of the week that I continued to work in Melbourne. The latter was an experience--living in a car half the week--but I come from working class people and remember my father doing so when he travelled to distant job sites, and my grandfather doing do in his station wagon when he went fencing on farms. It was the obvious choice, and I enjoyed the project of making it work. By living frugally I got into a position in which I considered it prudent, given my distance from work, to buy a second, back-up vehicle. A cheap motorcycle was the obvious choice. And so I bought this:

The purchase of that bike was a whole experience in itself: I bought it from a young, very bogan mechanic in Dandenong who had lost his license. Throughout the whole inspection and later purchase, his mother, unseen from somewhere inside the house, nagged at him, while in between explaining the bike to me or filling out the forms, he screamed back at her "WHAT!" and "Fucking shut up!" and other delights. I was reminded of this. Anyway, the V-Star was great fun. I have never sought great power in my bikes, and this 250 could do most things perfectly well, with the exception of losing speed on hills. But then some things happened. Two things, to be precise. In the decades prior I had ridden all over Victoria and Tasmania, in all conditions and at all hours, and had never crashed outside of a couple of spillsin the city. Around my new home, however, there are kangaroos in numbers I have not seen elsewhere. I have since had many near misses, and have smashed up the front of one car from such a collision, despite driving slowly from dusk onwards. It is local wisdom here that if ever you become lost in the bush, simply follow a kangaroo, for very soon it will lead you into the middle of the road. Well, on the way back from Rheola on my exciting V-Star, I hit a kangaroo at speed. My left foot still aches, five years later. Fortunately I managed to keep the bike upright, to the astonishment of my passenger. Then, a mere couple of months later, the same happened again. This time it was night, in the short stretch of highway speed between Carisbrook and Maryborough. I had not intended to be out that late, but there you have it. I collided with the animal on the front right of my bike, and felt its continued impact across the right of my body, which hurt like hell. In the collision my headlight was smashed off and so blinding me. The combination of the impact and my evasive manoeuvre sent me off the road at 80kph. I only knew this because the surface below me changed--I could not see a thing. I grabbed the brakes but started fishtailing in the gravel while still at high speed. One's mind can move incredibly fast in such moments, and as I considered the choice between braking again and probably going down, or just rolling to a stop but with the risk of hitting a pole while still at speed, I chose the latter. I have never believed in "dumping the bike to avoid an accident". As it was on that night, I was lucky.

In the weeks that followed, I found that I had lost my motorcycling mojo. I just couldn't relax on the bike, even in the middle of the day through open fields. Kangaroos are less common here at day, but certainly do jump out even then. I sold the bike and bought a 1980s ute. In time I took up drumming again, having stopped when I was 19, and like many musicians I became extra protective of my hands--another reason not to ride. You can hear some of my music on Facebook at "Matthew Bishop Drummer".

In my work, where I draw on philosophy to help people with hardship and flourishing, I have seen many clients with chronic pain, and the emotional misery and despair which they confess to me in all its dreaded dimensions, sometimes week in and out, has changed the way I feel about risks. I don't want to experience that. So, motorcycling became something "I used to do." A risk that was a great passion at a certain time in my life, and for which I was lucky to walk away mostly without injury. And so I have not ridden for five years. And yet, there's a danger in doing some things, but also in not doing them. I have a good life. I am more happy than I have ever been in my life. During Spring and Summer I play multiple gigs every weekend. I make a moderate but, given my old-fashioned frugality, very adequate living while doing work I am passionate about. I spend my spare time reading and writing in my field of work. I have a romantic relationship with a deeply intelligent, empathetic, and talented woman, which is now half a decade ongoing, and we share many similar passions and ways of being. And yet, something has been missing. Life is good, secure...safe. I've become comfortable. And soft. This of course is the usual answer we give: I need some more adenture. Well, hiking or gravel cycling is an adventure, and is much healthier, and much safer. No, there was something more that was missing. Something beyond mere adventure and the virtues associated with it. There has been an aliveness that was missing. An aliveness of a distinct kind, which comes from flying through the air, whether cold and grey, or golden and blanketing. Which comes from lying your body down on the forces that push back as you corner at speed. That comes from the journey at speed, where you forget yourself and your seperateness and become the sun, the heat, the landscape. There is also a beauty, almost undefinable, in chrome and wheels and the hot smell of leaking oil. There is something irreplaceable about motorcycling. As when I bought the V-Star, I am in a frugal situation, but of a different kind this time around. Last year I paid off my house. I am mortgage free, after only half a decade, but those extra payments were also my savings, so I have to start again financially. Hence, as a kind of history repeating, I gave myself a budget of $2000. I found and bought a 1997 Honda CB250 Nighthawk, with 23,000km on the clock. It is very good condition, very well stored and maintained. It came with a box of high quality consumables including a chain and sprockets, even though there is no need for such things at this time. Perhaps like myself, the previous owner had what I call sparanoia. As promised by the previous owner, the motor purrs and runs perfectly, and the bike rides beautifully. For the sake of my own sparanoia I have purchased a spare engine for $200, which I intend to dismantle and refresh with the help of a friend who also rides. After all, I now own two sheds, full of good tools and much bench space. This time around, I want to become the kind of motorcyclist who rebuilds his own engines. This is the life. This time around, I want to do riding differently. No more long days which mean getting caught out at dusk or returning after dark--no dodging kangaroos. But that's the beauty of where I live. It used to take an hour of commuting out of Melbourne to begin the real ride. Now I am in the midst of riding country. I pull out of my gate and turn right on top quiet roads leading to other towns, or left and into the bush, on good dirt roads which lead also to other towns. I live in the land of contemplative motorcycling. And, so, I begin my next chapter.