Hey Mister!

Pride comes before a fall.

I remember this incident well, even though I would much prefer to forget it completely. I can look back on it now and see that God had his hand on my life even then when I was his enemy.

It happened like this:

I had gone up to the shopping centre at Crows Nest to buy a large jar of honey, and I was riding a Mach Ill Kawasaki at the time, as I was into a bit of proddy racing at that stage. I rode everywhere at a zillion miles an hour, and raced anything that came along. I used to carry a large heavy chain about 4 feet long with a big padlock attached so that I could stop anyone pinching my bike.
Some of you may remember the 500cc Kawasaki 3 cylinder two stroke motorcycle. It wasn't the best handling bike I had ridden by a long shot, but it was a very quick machine for those days.

I used to delight in pulling 20 yard mono's across busy intersections (just to blow the cobwebs out of the exhausts of course!) Well, to get on with the story, I arrived at Crows Nest shopping centre and found a space right outside the shop where I wanted to purchase the goods. I had to squeeze the Kwakka into the space between two parked cars, but I had 3 inches either side, and in those days I deemed that sufficient clearance. Taking the chain and lock, I put it through the back wheel and around the ½ hour parking signpost, and off I went to do the shopping.

As I had arrived with my usual flash and noise, quite a few heads had turned. By the time that I had returned to the bike, I noticed that a few people had stopped to look, as it was one of the first 3 cylinder machines that a lot of people had seen. My ego immediately grew to giant proportions, as I realized I had an audience, so assuming my toughest demeanour, I casually strolled up to the bike and proceeded to ocky strap the parcel I was carrying onto the back of the seat.

Whilst I was doing so, an old fellow who had been eyeballing the bike stepped forward and started to ask a few questions about how fast it went, etc ...........

For the next ten minutes I hold forth in a loud voice to all and sundry, singing the praise of the Kawasaki, how fast it was and so on. Finally, puffed up beyond all recognition by the attention I was receiving, I leaped onto the seat, turned on the ignition and gave the kick-starter a prod. She fired up with a growl, and to impress the onlookers oven further, I gave it a little bit of a rev, (not past 8 grand) and listened with pride as the three exhaust pipes let out a scream like a hundred cats with their tails tied together. Oh, the joy! Oh the ego trip! Determined to really outdo myself, with a backwards wave of my hand to the onlookers, I kicked her into first slot, rocked her off the centre stand, gave her a handful of revs, and dropped the hammer.

The Kwakka leaped away like a startled gazelle.....

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.....but only to the end of the travel of four feet of heavy chain. With a mighty 'twang' the bike stopped dead but I kept going, straight up the tank, and ended up draped across the headlight. Meanwhile the rubber band effect had taken place.

The bike, having reached the end of the length of chain, had recoiled back-wards into the gutter. The back wheel hit so hard that it bent the rim, the chain wrapped itself around the spokes, ripping about 6 right out and bending about 8 others. Suffering from severe pain from the lower abdominal regions, and taking into account the fact that I was sitting astride the headlight. I was unable to do a thing as the Kwakka, in a beautiful display of slow motion, fell over and played dead.

As I lay there on the road, with my right log pinned under the front of the bike and unable to move, all my pride and ego swiftly drained out of me and I saw two little feet standing on the road beside my head. Attached to these two grubby feet was a five year old kid. Bending over me, he said the words that really made my morning for me,

"Hey Mister, ya forgot to unlock ya chain".

With a moan of utter despair and through clenched tooth I softly but vehemently told him to go away. (I used language a bit stronger than that, but I won't repeat what I said here). Apparently, he was a bit hard of bearing or something because he said again, in a much louder voice, "But mister, ya forgot to unlock ya chain."

Something went 'snap' in my head, and with a cry, I shook the bike off my leg like a dog shaking off water. Forgetting the pain emanating from my bruised nether regions, I stood up, fumbling for the key to unlock the chain. All of my admiring onlookers had suddenly turned into a crowd of amused hecklers. With as much speed as possible I undid the padlock and picked up the bike.

I spent the next ten minutes sitting in the gutter unravelling the sticky chain from the back wheel and spokes, and when I had finally got it all undone and everything was sorted out, I got on the bike, gave her a few kicks, poked it into gear, and wobbled and bumped away down the street towards home and some iodine, leaving behind a long trail of sticky honey. The last thing I saw as I looked back over my shoulder was this little freckled faced kid, one finger in his mouth sucking the honey, the other lifted in a wave goodbye.

The moral of the whole thing?

The Lord detests all the proud of heart. Be sure of this: They will not go unpunished. Proverbs 16:5 (NIV)

Amen. Praise the Lord.

Ray.

First published in "Breaking Free" (editor David Martin), 1982.
Story by Ray L, artwork by Keith M
Text prepared on Phil's old IBM Composer (he later upgraded from the mechanical version to an electronic one); layed up with knife and glue, and printed on an old offset printer.

First published online by David Martin in 2002, with minor modifications & corrections. Scanned, processed, edited & (draft copy) published to the Web in about one hour.

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