Revenge of the Soccer Dads
Revenge of the Soccer Dads
LEANINGS
Peter Egan
MY OLD BUDDY STEVE KIMBALL CAME over from Michigan last week with his
son Ben-who just graduated from college-and stayed at our place for a weekend visit in Wisconsin.
It was good to see them again, but they hadn’t come merely to visit us, heart-warming as that motive might be. Seems Steve’s daughter, Kathy, is a student at the University of Wisconsin, in nearby Madison, and he and Ben were here to help her move from the dorm into a student apartment for the summer.
Some of you who are more than 100 years old may still recognize Steve’s name. He was the Managing Editor of this magazine in the early Eighties, back when I joined the staff as Technical Editor. Steve and I soon developed a lively friendship based on a tendency to get matching pairs of speeding tickets any time we rode together, as well as a common sense of humor that relies on damning with faint praise as its core mechanism.
I refer to Steve (who has a Navy background in nuclear engineering) as “the Einstein of people who aren’t especially bright,” and he calls here asking for “the Herman Melville of drive chain maintenance.”
We have a lot of fun, yet seldom resort to actual violence.
Anyway, Steve came over a few weeks ago, and I couldn’t help but notice that his motorcycle helmet and jacket were in the back of his family wagon. I also noticed that he was eyeing my new/leftover blue Ducati ST2 with more than casual interest. If the bike had been a daughter, I would have locked her in the attic until he was gone.
“Want to take that bike for a ride?” I offered.
“Sure,” Steve said with a muffled voice as he pulled on his helmet and I took a quick step backward to get out of his way.
I looked at him through the fogged visor and shouted, “A good local test ride is to take Old Stage Road over to Highway 14 and then come back on Highway 59. It’s a nice little 10-mile loop with some good corners.”
Steve nodded, shot down the driveway and disappeared for about a week.
Actually, it only seemed that long; he was probably gone for less than two hours. As Ben and I awaited his return, I said, “Gee, I hope Steve is okay. There’s loose gravel on some of the corners...” Ben grinned. “Oh, he’ll be all right. He’s just lost. But he’ll find his way back eventually.”
And he did. Steve came riding up the driveway just in time for dinner. “Nice bike,” he said, thoughtfully examining the mechanical details of the ST2. “I’m thinking of getting a newer motorcycle myself...”
Like a lot of people who are now in their late 40s or early 50s, Steve has had to sublimate his desire for new and fancy motorcycles for a decade or more as he and his wife Denise have ushered their two children through the Expensive Years, that time of life when they needed soccer uniforms, music lessons, straight teeth, the occasional square meal and-the big one-college tuition.
Unlike a lot of people, however, Steve didn’t quit riding; he simply scaled down a bit. During those years, he put his 883 Sportster on the block, and turned that bike into some ready cash and a pair of used Honda FT500 Singles, which he bought for $500 each. He also had a Yamaha 550 Vision for a while, and an XL250 Honda to run around on in the dirt. Then, a couple of years ago, he really splurged and spent $ 1700 on a pristine 1992 Yamaha Seca IL He’s been riding that right up to the present.
But with Number One Son out of college, Number One Daughter nearly through and wife Denise having recently earned her teaching credentials and employed in the local school system, Steve is clearly picking up financial steam and getting that slightly manic “Somebody stop me!” Jim Carrey look in his eye.
It’s kind of fun to see. My riding buddy Jim Wargula is going through exactly the same phase with his kids right now (son Matt just graduated from college), and in the past year he’s bought a Ducati 900SS and a BMW R100RS. I get the feeling he’s not done yet. We keep stopping to look at new BMWs wherever we pass a dealership. Not to mention Harleys.
But back to Steve: A few days after he and Ben returned home to Michigan, Steve phoned to say he’d sold his Seca II and bought a really clean, lowmileage silver 1998 Ducati ST2. He found it at a local Ducati shop for only $5500. With luggage, no less. (Only Steve can find deals like this.) And every time I talk to him on the phone now, he’s just been out for an evening ride. Says he loves the bike.
I am naturally quite happy for him, and pleased at his impeccable taste in motorcycles (or high suggestibility, whichever you prefer), but there are a couple of observations I’m tempted to make about this gradually unfolding chain of events.
First, I notice that, despite the personal sacrifices Steve made by not blowing money on all kinds of new, trendy and exotic bikes for the past 15 years or so, he really didn’t suffer very much in terms of riding quality. All of his bikes were fun, quick, agile, comfortable and essentially free. Steve told me he actually made money on his last six bikes. Which is more than I can say.
Also, while it’s nice to see Steve and Jim upgrading to faster and more comfortable road bikes that might work better on a long trip, the best part (from my perspective) is that they might have more time in the next few years to take some of those trips. Like we used to. It’s never the bikes that hold us back; it’s finding the time to use them.
And, as a final thought, I should point out that both Jim and Steve’s kids have turned out to be polite, thoughtful, wellspoken, lively and fun to be around.
I hate to tell these guys, but they could have had a bike with carbon-fiber mufflers instead of all those expensive, welleducated children.
And now, of course, they have both. Here’s to graduates everywhere.
