It's All About the Bike

June 14, 1974. The day I got my first road bike. I remember it well.

It was a bike that I had wanted for some time. I had seen it in a pamphlet I got from the local bike shop, George Garner Cyclery in Northbrook, Illinois. I spent months doing odd jobs and scraping together money in order to buy this bike.

When the day came, my mom took me down to the bike shop and they brought it up from the basement. I looked it over and told the guy who brought it up to get me another one because this one had a scratch on it. The adults then looked at me like I was crazy and said this is your bike. All righty then.

I got on the bike just outside the store and told my mother I would see her at home. There is nothing quite like the sound of a new bike. It is so quiet and charged up with the adventures that lay ahead. When I got home, my friends were all waiting there to see the new beauty. Russ Williams decided that we should try it out so we all went for a ride down to Glencoe Beach. It was sweet.

When you're 13 years old, a bike is your way out into the world. My family did not go on vacations, so this was it. Freedom baby. Within a year, my friends and I were charting courses as far away as Fox Lake, Illinois. For a 14 year old kid, 62 miles round trip was pretty good. We stretched one trip intended for Wilmot Mountain into an 80 mile ordeal. Oh the places you will go...

As I got older, I hung on to that bike. It made it's way to The Woodlands, Texas when I was 18. It visited Eastern Illinois University when I was 20. It found its way down to Texas again when I was 24. It returned to Illinois when I was 30. It traveled to Colorado when I was 38 and remains with me today.

Today, I have had that 1974 Schwinn Sprint bicycle for 36 years. It was in my basement this morning and I pumped up the tires and took it for a spin this afternoon.

It no longer is my primary road ride. Back in 2003, I bought a Lemond Tourmalet that I will have had 7 years already this fall. Why do I keep the old Sprint? Is it a symbol of my journey out into the world? Or is it a tangible part of my past that illustrates if you want something bad enough, you will and can attain or achieve it. I don't know. Time will tell.