Backseat - From Where I Sit

November 2005

By: Michelle

Schoolgirl(?) Musings

As a result in a brief lapse of sanity, I decided to return to school only to find out that it is not just my outsides that aren’t what they used to be. The inner workings of my brain seem to have the same “lack of elasticity” as the rest of me and my attention span is just another forgotten memory. Never the less, I find myself spending hours caring about things I hadn’t thought about in over 25 years like homework, test grades and term papers. Unfortunately the main thing I can remember after hours of studying is why I couldn’t wait to graduate last time and how I would much rather be out on a nice joyride on the bike than read the next chapter on the newest management theory in my textbook.

It’s not the learning that’s the problem, it’s the time taken away from so many better things to do. I try to stay focused and wonder why time won’t just stand still when I am concentrating. It just seems wasteful that things are continuing to happen that I can’t be a part of. One fortunate side-effect, though, is the joy I get from letting my mind wander (they say exercise is good). As I sit mesmerized listening to my professor drone on and on (I seriously wonder if I should tell him he only has one great big bushy eyebrow that bounces up and down when he speaks), I find it impossible to concentrate as I feel the sunshine streaming in the window and I swear I can hear a bike rumbling by in the distance – mocking me.

Luckily for me, I still remember how to configure my face into the “I’m paying attention” look. Over the years I have also matured enough to understand the strategic maneuver of fake understanding. With the appropriate amount of eye contact and nodding, it is easy to convince almost anyone that you actually know what you are doing. This is a great tool in the classroom but I would never recommend using it out on the road. There is very little room for faking it when there is the possibility of grinding into the asphalt if you don’t know what you are doing.

The more I think about it, the more I believe that motorcycling is more realistic than school. In class when you are totally lost you can always ask yourself “how hard can it be?” and figure it out later. This is definitely something that you will never ask yourself when riding where later always comes sooner than you would like and everything from blades of grass to gentle raindrops are hard…These are all important deep thoughts that never occurred to me until this very moment when I am supposed to be listening to how to calculate an estimated project timeframe. As professor continues to drone and I continue to dream lulled by the rhythm of that one bouncing eyebrow…

I am back in school. In my fantasy world, I am a rebel eagerly waiting on the school bell to ring to signal my freedom so I can slip out and hop on the back of the bike being driven by my favorite guy outside – ready to take on the world. Actually, it’s not so different than my real world now, where my guy is still there, patiently waiting for me to finish my schoolwork. The hair may be greyer and the only thing we may be rebelling against is old age but…look out world here we come!

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