Last night I got out my bike and went for a ride. It’s been a really long time since I’ve ridden, and I have good excuses for not riding: most of all, that my current prosthetic leg tends to come off after about half a mile of pedaling.
I only went about 1/3 of a mile when my chain locked on me. I had to walk the bike home. But I persisted–I riffled through John’s bike supplies and found some chain lube, which I applied liberally. Then I spun the wheels round and round until they stopped sticking. Then I got on and cautiously (just in case the chain froze again) went back and forth between my place and my garden. Then I wheeled up and down the nearby hill and did donuts in the parking lot.
I was pretty oblivious to anyone around me as I was biking in the dark. And I suppose I did look rather strange on my red tricycle in the dark, smiling from ear to ear. So when a car-full of college kids sang out to me as they drove slowly past me in the parking lot, I was rather startled at first. They intoned the slightly-altered chorus of a Queen song, “I want to ride your tricycle….” (btw, I do love me some Queen). I suppose they might’ve meant it rudely–after all I was quite an odd sight out there. But I took it as a compliment. :)
After I got home I realized that I haven’t really biked much at all since my surgery two years ago. My lower leg was burning a bit around my incision, which wasn’t an entirely-comfortable feeling. I suspect that there some scar tissue in there that’s getting a good stretch.
But it feels great to be back on three wheels again. I’ll be getting a tweak to my leg soon that will hopefully solve the falling-off problem, so I hope to be biking more often from here on out! :)