[Zedder]

My last HD post...I promise. This is a short story about how I got into bikes in 1992...

"Everybody wants a Fat Boy"

I took delivery of this beautiful 1965 FLH this morning and after we unloaded it I took the truck driver into the garage to show him my other bikes. When he saw my 1990 Fat Boy, he said, "nice...everybody wants a Fat Boy". That comment took me back 24 years to the time when I bought my first Harley. It was 1992 and Harley's were just becoming mainstream. Being a gear head my entire life, I thought they were cool and wanted one. However, I have to admit that I was afraid that they were too dangerous and that fear was stopping me from buying. As was my parent's constant reminders of every bike accident that made the news!

I was a very serious martial artist at the time and took off to a week long black belt Summer camp with my little pocket sized HD brochure in my duffle bag (I still have it - see pic below). Each night after training, I would look at the pics in the brochure trying to decide which one I liked best.

On the last day of camp, I was fighting a guy that I didn't know and was beating him pretty badley. We fought full contact to the body and light contact to the head without any protective gear. In one exchange I swept his legs out and he landed pretty hard. As I bowed in preparation for the next round, he spun in with a hook kick to my head without any warning. The kick spun me around, but didn't knock me out. However, it did break my cheek bone off and cracked my eye socket.

After seeing a plastic surgeon (who told me that I would have died if the kick landed 1 inch higher) I was given Tylenol 3's and told to go home and wait for a call for surgery. My face had a dent in it where my cheek bone used to be and I couldn't open my mouth more than a half inch due to the muscle spasms.

Having something like this happen to you makes you question your fears in life. I had trained for almost 20 years with nothing more than some bruises and a few stitches and in a split second your life could have been over....

The next morning I grabbed my HD brochure and went to Poole's Harley Davidson in Hamilton. I got some pretty strange looks walking in there with a black eye and a big dent in my head! I was looking around and these two big bikers were standing looking at a bike. I couldn't see past them, but heard one of them say, "that's a Fat Boy...everybody wants a Fat Boy". When they moved on, I went over and that was it...I wanted a Fat Boy too.

I had surgery 2 days later and got everything put back in place. Poole's wouldn't work with me on the price of a new bike, so I found a better deal at Clare's Cycle. I ordered a black 1993 Fat Boy as the '92's were sold out. I got my bike license a month later and the bike came in a month after that. I had to get my brother-in-law to ride it home for me as I had never ridden anything bigger than a dirt bike. That Fat Boy helped me through a difficult time and I still smile every time I think about it - like this morning after the truck driver's comment...