the guy on the crotch rocket got me thinking

So as I sit here trying to clean our computer/dog bedroom I hear the call of the wild....A crotch rocket, one of my true loves. The feeling I used to get on one of those is indescribable but boy could it take the worst day and turn it into a good one a 5 minute ride could wipe the frown off my face. But I did have a terrible accident on my crotch rocket, I hit a deer on it at about 75 mph. I had just passed a car with a car coming down the road at me I had no where to go, the last thing I saw was the deer jumping in front of me and the next thing I know I was flung to the ground getting pushed by the bike for a 150 feet up the road. It was like being in the dryer I suppose just barrel rolling . Finally it stopped and I jumped up to my feet thinking lets get back on the bike and get out of here. But wait I have no shoes on oh there they are in the middle of the highway I walk over to get them and then I reach down to pick them up and I realize I have a broken wrist, the parts from my blessed bike all over the highway looking like a yard sale. I go and call my father I just left him 30 minutes ago from fathers day dinner and tell him dad Im ok but I hit a deer on the bike Im going to this hospitial, the one he works at. And I hang up he never wanted me to have this bike anyways but I always promised I would wear a helmet wich I did. I am sitting there and then I feel a agonizing pain in my back and lay down the only way it doesnt hurt. The people I had seen before hitting the deer in the cars coming at me stopped to help, they said the paramedics would be there fast. Fast forward to laying in the hospital and not saying anything about the pain in my left leg the 5 cat scans in 1 day, the moment the orthopedic dr walks in and says you have three fractured bones in your lower back and a sprained ankle. plus the broken wrist you already know about. And then my family and friends started to see me, I think it hurt worse when my grandfather came in to see me I knew how he felt, I saw him after his heart attack and it killed me. So I know this hurt him. He did ride motorcycles so we understood the dangers. Well it is almost 3 years since then I am fine now excpet the back pain I suffer when the weather changes or I move wrong. But this kid with no helmet, only shorts and no gloves is riding around on sandy side roads on jan 27 has got no idea the pain that can come from a fall on a bike so I want to make this the longest post in history by adding this story I found about motorcycles>>>>>>> No Need For Gear
Author Unknown

Riding without boots and crashing might cost you some road rash or foot mash or even in an extreme case might lead to amputation. You might never walk without a limp. You might battle a weight and fitness problem for the rest of your
life. You might never walk with pain. But it probably wouldn't kill you.

Riding without gloves and crashing might cost you some road rash or a Munched hand or the severe, excruciating pain of mangling a body part rich with nerve endings. Or you could lose a finger or two. It could cost you the ability to play ball with your son, to properly feel the gentle curve of a woman’s breast, or to hold a beer. But it probably wouldn't kill you.

Riding without at least an armored jacket and leather trousers or full leathers or an Aerostich or even just a leather jacket and jeans and crashing might cost you serious road rash. You might grind off a nipple. You might embed gravel in your elbow. You might get beef jerky all over your back. You might grind off your kneecap or have a scar resembling Australia on you calf like a friend of mine does. You would be scarred for life and not be able to walk on a beach shirtless without feeling self conscious. You might end up like Kevin Spacey's character in "Pay It Forward" and have to deal with the same awkward moment every time you remove your clothes with a new lover. But it probably won't kill you.

Riding without a back protector and crashing in all but rare crashes would be inconsequential. However, there are so many variables out there- curbs, fenders, poles, guardrails, and debris in the road- any one of these could be the golden BB that nicks your spinal cord in just the wrong way and leaves you in a wheelchair for life. Or, maybe you just have constant sciatic pain in one leg. Or you can't move your legs. Or you have to wear diapers for when you shit yourself, and/or a colostomy bag you have to pull out of your pants leg and squeeze your waste out into the toilet at a bar like a guy I know. Or you can't move from the chest down. Or from the neck down. Are you good at working joysticks with your mouth? Or maybe you might need a respirator? Or 24 hour care? Certainly, there are impacts that are completely foreseeable that would permanently injure you even with the best back protector in the world. But there are crashes and subsequent impacts that even mediocre back protectors can make that little bit of difference in- the ones you get up and walk away from, sore all over, but *walking*. Do you want the last time you walked to be when you walked out of 7-11 with a pack of smokes and then got on your bike? Those precious few steps out the door and over to the bike to be the five steps you remember the rest of your life because the next time you were off the bike you were lying strapped to a backboard staring at the head liner of an ambulance, tears running down your face because you couldn't feel your little piggies and you were almost ready to vomit at the stench of your shit because you lost control of your bowels? Riding without a back protector and crashing might not make a difference, or it might make all the difference in the world. It might not kill you, but it might make you wish it had.
And, finally, helmets. Riding without a helmet and crashing might be of no consequence. You might never even touch terra firma with your head. Or you might give yourself an asphalt facelift. You might get a concussion that results in only a bad headache the next day. You might get a serious concussion that lands you in the hospital for endless CAT scans and MRIs, and for the rest of your days be plagued by migraines. You might fracture your orbital and lose your vision. You might fracture your skull and end up
fully functional but with a horrible Frankenstein like scar and a metal plate that bothers you on cold days and sets of metal detectors in airports. You might have a closed head injury from which you don't awaken from for hours or days or weeks or months- all the while your mother, father, sister, brother, children, workmates, and/or riding buddies come a visit you, filling an utterly depressing hospital room into a gauche jungle of flowers and bright card saying "get well soon!" that you never see or smell. Sure, you might awaken completely normal besides the hole drilled in your head to reduce pressure. Or you might awaken a little fuzzy, unsure who these people are. Or you might awaken and have to re-learn everything it took you all your life to learn, eventually returning to normal or even better like Harrison Ford in "Regarding Henry". Or you might awaken a man-child, drooling and laughing as you try to stack blocks, wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt signed by your mother, father, sister, brother, children, workmates, and/or riding buddies- which you will never read. Or you might have an open head injury, from which the "you" you know will most likely never return. The rest of your life -be it a day, a week, a month, a year- will consist of feeding tubes, the endless beep and whoosh of the heart monitor and respirator, and the drip-drip or IV fluids, catheters in your rod, and feeding tubes. Of course, you won't mind all of this; you'll be in a dream land no one knows about. Your body will waste away and
atrophy. Eventually, the shell that used to be you would give out, and your loved ones would have to make the most grueling decision of their life. Or, you might die on the road, fluffy gray brain matter mixing with blood and cerebro-spinal fluid. Perhaps your last ride would be twenty miles an hour down the street by your house combined with an impatient young driver and an
ignored stop sign. Or perhaps it would be a ride on the freeway and a pothole denting your rim and popping the front tire off the bead sending you into the guardrail. Or you might go out in a blaze of glory with a 100 mph wheelie ending the wrong way. Whichever way, would make maybe a 10 second news story depending on where you live, maybe a paragraph buried on page 32B of the paper. Riding without a helmet could be of no matter- or it could mean the difference between going on as you are now, or having life taken away from you as if God flipped a switch.

I can live without toes or a mangled foot- but I choose to try and prevent that. I can live with a hand that looks like a burn victim's and maybe relearn to write with my left hand- but I choose to try and prevent that. I can live with a scar in the shape of Australia on my calf- but I try and prevent that. I can live with road rash on my torso and arms- but I try to prevent that. I could live in a wheelchair, agonizing through every day, but I choose to try and prevent that.

I can't live as a man-child. I've already played with blocks. I only drool when I sleep.

We all make choices. Gear can't always save you. All the best leather, denim, Corduroy, Kevlar, fiberglass, and plastic are useless when fate throws the Immovable Object or the Irresistible Force in your path. But I choose to stack the deck in my favor. If it all ends up for naught and the stacked deck and the cards up my sleeve end up losing to Fate's royal flush, so be it. But I'll try.
-Author unknown-