Fast and loose

A story about lake jumping and the perils of dirt jumping afterward, on blue booze

The year might have been 1995, or 1996. We went lake-jumping and partially inflated inner tubes that were sort of intertwined in our wheels so that our bikes would float after we jumped in. I used my main bike and this was risky and probably was what led to that thing cracking and needing replacement in 1997. But it was fun. I was chicken-shit and wouldn't flip or really commit to a spin, but I hucked all day down at the lake and we took photos. The day was awesome aleady and when we got back to Mikey's and it was still light outside and his parents were gone, we figured they wouldn't miss some of the blue sapphire booze in the liquor cabinet. I forgot what we mixed it with, but we got pretty fucked up. We would have been 15 at this point, Mikey and I basically sharing a birthday. We knew not to drive or would have never dared, but we had every intention in the world of riding our bikes down the hill from edgemont.We slammed quite a bit of blue booze and I don't remember but I think we drank it straight from the bottle. It was blue and so nothing else would have made sense.

As we always did, we raced down the hill in tuck position, each one of us drafting off the other bitch and making bold passes on our 20" bikes as cars blew past us. One of us got to Chapman Hill first and since G-money Girard was there jumping, we figured we should too. Or at least in my head it was a "we." My grips were slipping bad and I was drunk so there is no way I should have been riding my bike. But instead of not riding, I proceeded to jump those jumps, which was before the building was built at Chapman Hill but after the outdoor rink was built. I am sure the history buffs will comment and confirm whether the story takes place in 1995 or 1996. I'm thinking 1995. We were drunk though, so I don't remember.

My grips were all loose from the lake jumping and I was drunk, so I shouldn't have been jumping, but I was all flowy and loose from the blue sapphire so I jumped anyway. My grips were loose, so instead of using them, I just invented a million one-hander variations, including the "let go with the left hand, grab the crossbar, then let go of the right hand, then grab back with the right hand and put the left hand back on the throttle grip" trick which has been imitated but never repeated.

I didn't crash on my bike that day, but I deserved to. Our day continued and the bikes were central as always. I never did that trick again.