before moving

Dropping off the movie truck I begin walking two miles back to my home of two years for the last time. I was excited to be moving to the east side. Excited to be living somewhere different, somewhere with gritty sidewalks and bicycle thefts as I walk down a street with its quaint cottages and landscape architectured lawns resembling Santa Barbara in miniature.


The sun is warm and the air salty as I pass an auto part store I never knew was there for the last time but this time I stop to notice two things on a vintage Triumph Bonneville parked in front of the store. First were the exhaust pipes. The pipes swept back and up towards the carburetor before banking away towards the rear shocks. The pipes looked like a crooked mustache on a fickle bike. While the exhaust manifold running so near the carburetor will likely preheated the air as it passing into the manifold but the look was bold. The gear shifter was on the right side of the bike but this could be common to many British motorcycles.


From the right side the bike appears to have no rear brake but on closer inspection the rear drum brake is mounted on the left side of the bike, inside of the rear sprocket. It's beautiful and I wish I could have taken it apart just to see the casting of or the drive/brake mechanism. This gives the bike a clean look although I've never really believed drum brakes work.

I continued walking home for the last time before moving to where I'll say I was once from.

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