Motorcycle Fail

So I took a motorcycle safety course with my dad over the weekend. I had never even been a passenger on a motorcycle but it's something I have wanted to do since I was 15 and watched Easy Rider with my dad in our living room. My dad found out the dates for the course and my job was to just call and confirm my registration. I did it pretty quickly amongst a million other things going on at the time. So I was all signed up and just had to buy some boots and wait for the class. When we were finally heading to the course, I think it finally dawned on me that I was going to be riding a motorcycle.

The first evening of class was just classroom instruction so not too scary. But I somehow had failed to grasp the fact that we were going to be tested on this stuff and that if we passed we could do down to the DOL and get our endorsement. Oh yah. So that part got me a bit nervous. The next morning we were geared up and ready to ride at 7:45am. We started out with very basic skills and each exercise built on the one before it. So it was actually okay. By the end of the first day of riding I felt pretty confident. The next day, I seemed to have forgotten the basics and the whole practice just seemed to not be as solid as the day before. By the time the test came I was a nervous wreck and pretty much blew the whole thing. I wasn't really too upset about it, considering I had really just wanted to learn how to ride and get familiar with the sport. My dad, by the way, got 100%. What a show off.

My dad and I have formulated a plan to get some practice time in this summer and retake the course in the fall. I do know there are people on this earth (my friend Laura being one of them) that were able to pass the test on the first try, having never ridden a bike before the course, but I was not one of them. Among all the gifts and natural abilities God has given me, if motorcycle riding is not one of them, I'm okay with that. If it would have been a karaoke test or a make-a-chicken-pot-pie-from-scratch test, I would've schooled all those guys.