Speed the Wheel: Head Cold

My articles frequently have me meandering through some storied recollection from my past. This time, however, I want to borrow a story from older brother Barry’s treasure trove of two-wheeled memories. We recently reminisced about the good ole days of our carefree youths—which were monopolized by motorized obsessions. After six decades as siblings I thought I’d heard all of his stories. I was wrong.

My brother is a master storyteller. Not content to merely toss out some vagaries and loose facts, he revels in painting verbal pictures. His recollection of a particular incident from his teens was so poignant, I just had to share it.

The Garage

Like me, Barry was part of the youth movement of the early ‘70s that helped drive the motorcycle craze to its glorious zenith. For us, this was a particularly blissful period. We were in our teens. I possessed a motorcycle permit. Barry had the coveted motorcycle endorsement stamp on his driver’s license. The Buchanan family lived in a small house in Pacific Palisades, CA, on Friends St.