My origin story as an adult cyclist, the ride that brought me back into the fold, occurred on a small residential street in Midtown Memphis in 1985, behind the pro music store in Memphis, Strings and Things. I worked in their drum department, called The Drum Stand. My boss there was a John Bonham look-alike, provided John Henry Bonham had red hair to his shoulders and stood 6-foot-6. Okay, maybe not, but he sure sounded like him. Big Dave was called Big Dave because, but also because he has one of the biggest hearts I’ve ever encountered.
Big Dave was leaving Memphis to go to a big drum company as their new CEO. From retail manager to CEO. Neat trick. Show your friends. And while everyone at Strings and Things was psyched for him to have such a great opportunity, we were all broken-hearted over his departure.
Big Dave was less my boss than my mentor. He saw me in a way, saw passion, promise and potential in me, when few others did. Under him, I grew. The last day I saw him in Memphis, he took me out to his truck to show me the old cruiser he’d just bought used for $50 and was going to take with him to Connecticut.
He pulled it out and pushed it into my hands. “Go for a ride,” he said. It was a bike. You didn’t have to ask twice. How long had it been since I’d last been on a bike? Five years? Six? No, don’t answer.
I turned the pedals over a few times and then I was rolling down a gentle grade, the wind sifting through my long hair, the summer air parting, my T-shirt flapping. There’s a sublime quality to that first ride back after a long break. Something in our brain stem lights up, something that had gone forgotten in the interim.
As I sailed down the road, my first thought was, “This is awesome.” Not an original thought, but an essential thought, inescapable in its truth as, “I’m hungry.” My second thought was a question. “Why did I stop doing this?”
My third thought changed the course of my life. “I’m gonna buy a bike.”