Helmets? Your Choice, My Preference

I saw a meme on Facebook this morning: "Watch out for motorcycles."

I'm not going to tell you what to do or how to drive. I drive defensively, trying to just have my space from other vehicles, hoping to give myself more time to react if something happens. It's one of the reasons I hate tailgaters, no matter what they're driving.

Again, I won't tell you what to do, but I'll tell you what I do.

I bought a motorcycle 30 years ago and took it for a spin through town. I couldn't believe how many people didn't see me in traffic. And keep in mind that this was before cell phones. So after one trip downtown, I went home and put an ad in the paper, and sold it.

Fast forward to buying four-wheelers. You can make them street-legal, which I did. But you'll never see me driving down Main Street at any time of day. Those are for trail riding and buzzing around my rural neighborhood and plowing snow.

If I am to die in an accident involving something motorized, then I hope it had four wheels and was my own fault, not the fault of somebody who's on their damned phone and never saw me before they hit me.

And the state needs to do a safety campaign about lane filtering. Most drivers don't realize that it's legal, and it's making drivers mad when the bikes creep up between cars at stoplights.

And helmet or no helmet? That's your call.

I'm helmet.