At this a long time . . .

Bikes have been a large part of my life since I was 5. That was the year that the training wheels came off and I taught myself to ride in my front yard. By 6 or 7 I was riding a "Huffy Knock Off" and I was so small that I needed a cinder block to get on it and start pedaling. I actually had one cinder block at my house and another one down the street.

I grew up on a dead end street. Literally not figuratively. We rode bikes all day every day. We raced up and down the street and built jumps, daring each other to see who would hit them first. When we weren't riding we were sitting around in the grass dreaming aloud "What if a Diamondback Turbo just fell out of the sky for each of us."

As the years have gone on, bikes have continued to play a large role in my life. Recently Tim O. and I were reminiscing about the time we were taking a photography class in high school and we decided to do a photo shoot including: 1 Jump, 1 Diamondback Silver Streak, 1 Pond, and my Pentax K1000.

This picture is the result of that "photo shoot." Last weekend I went to my parents house and with the help of my mother, I was able to get my hands on this picture. I'm afraid the negative is long gone, but I was able to get a pretty good image of the picture with my iPhone.

If I had to guess, we were probably 17 at the time. We went to a local pond, built a sketchy jump at the end of the dock, and took a few quick pics. After I was pretty sure I had a decent picture, I decided to give it a go. As a 17 year old "roadie" I hadn't hit a jump in more than a few years and as soon as I hit the jump, my front wheel dove forward into the water and I landed in a lame headfirst splash. At that same time, the property owner rounded the corner on a tractor and saw it all unfolding. He was yelling, I was trying to drag the bike out of the pond, and Tim and I grabbed our stuff and sprinted out of there. I was in the dark room as soon as humanly possible and this was the best shot on the roll.

I'm not entirely sure what the point of this post is, but suffice it to say bikes have been and continue to be a big part of my life. I'm fairly certain that if a Diamondback Turbo was to finally fall out of the sky and land in my front yard, Tim or Drummroll and I would have a jump built with minutes of the landing. We'd dare each other to hit it first, and after Tim and Drumm hit it, I'd finally be shamed into giving it a go. I'm also fairly certain that I'd endo the jump again.

Love to ride your bike!