Really. Dan and I were cruising the River Trail, enjoying a gorgeous fall afternoon. The trail was
dry and hard, there weren't a lot of people around, we were talking and joking, cranking along at
about 12 to 14 mph. We'd just passed through a narrower section of trail so I was behind him by
about 30 feet, when I saw him suddenly jolt or jerk. Then the rear wheel lifted off the ground.
There were a pair of loud pops - his cleats disengaging from the pedals - as he launched skywards,
with the bike somersaulting through the air after him, on roughly the same trajectory. Flyball gives
you a new appreciation for small increments of time. He was airborne no longer than a second, a
second and a quarter, but I had time to notice how impossibly graceful he looked in flight, time
enough to think, "Oh hell, there goes the other shoulder", followed closely by, "Look out! Here
comes the bike!". Then he tucked into a perfect diving roll, the bike smashing to the ground less
than two feet away from him. He was on his feet before I came to a complete stop, and his immediate
attention to the 4-Banger told me he was probably not seriously injuried - no separated shoulder, no
broken wrist, no major holes were there hadn't been previously. Not this time. He thinks that a
chunk of stick, hidden under the deep fallen leaves, had kicked up and momentarily lodged in his
front wheel, locking it up. And that it must've caught in the disk brake, since there were no broken
or damaged spokes. He had a few minor scrapes, and I'm sure he'll still be finding bruises over the
next couple of days. But the bike was entire unharmed. Not a mark on it. It was truly an amazing
thing to see. It's not every day you get to see your husband fly. Still, I pretended to be
unimpressed. Told him to get back to me when he could walk on water.
Kathleen