The show was financed by our
general audience faces (and ears), by individual gifts, by bequests. When necessary we conceived money- making adventures. For example, we invited people to pay for a cruise north to Alaska, and another south, while I gave daily lectures either way. A second adventure: my bicycle. I committed myself to making a tour across the Midwestern states and the cities and the Midwestern radio stations that carried Lutheran Vespers. To draw attention to the tour, I planned to travel the miles, and every mile, on my bicycle, a “Bonetrager”—light, with a tensile strength, and a perfect fit to the foot, the butt, the torso, the hand. More than ride the bike, I wore it. Perhaps you have experienced
the affection that a human heart can develop for a mechanical thing— especially when one depends upon that thing and they hang out together a good long while. We started in Chi- cago, rode to and into and through Wisconsin, Minnesota, then changed our mode of transportation for North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana. Just outside of Alexandria, Minn., 1,014 miles into the trip (when I’d grown as trim as a 20-year-old athlete, when I breathed easily and was stroking the roads with long, lean, tireless muscles), I bent into a sweeping left turn through the inter- section of two four-lane highways. Halfway into the turn one of my pan- niers snapped and caught in my back wheel. The wheel locked. I hit hard on my left hip and skidded, then lay still, and spent a while considering things.
It was a cool autumn morning. Overcast. I was lying on my side, not upright and pedaling. And my bones were asking questions. High in my left thigh, as if the marrow had
suddenly frozen solid: “Wha-a-a?” I laid a moment longer then rolled and tried to stand, felt a dull elemental pain, and collapsed in a sweat. Three holes were drilled in my hipbone, and three pins were driven into the holes to hold my broken parts together.
After a break of three days we con- tinued and completed the tour, travel- ing now on crutches and in a car. Bontrager: Bone Breaker. The bike was an extension of myself. And even after the fall it continued to represent speed and a personal athleticism because I healed. In that year I still could heal. And I rode the bike again, and found the same fit and the same windy freedom. I am able to let so many things go. Why not this bike? It’s in the garage. Last week I took it down from its hook and pumped the tires full of air. I lifted it: so light in my hand. I let the bike’s inflated tires bounce on the concrete floor. Sturdy, the bike. And healthy. I’ll never be able to ride it again, not a single city block to and fro. Yet I keep it. So there are some was’s I wish
were is’s again. Of course. But the bicycle? A trophy? A souvenir? Something sentimental? Touch its bars, its forks, its wheel rims. These are the bones of the boy that was. Touch the past.
Last night I dreamed we were staying near the shores of Lake Michigan. Before anyone else was awake, I walked out onto the beach. A windless sunrise, yet the slow swells shiver with ripples. And then I’m in the lake, swim- ming a long-armed crawl. The water is only slightly cooler than the weather. I have no trouble breath- ing. I’m remembering this detail, because in the instant I’m uncon- scious of breath. I am swimming. It occurs to me to wonder what I’m wearing. A T-shirt and knee-length
shorts. It doesn’t matter whether I’m swimming in or out to sea. And then I’m back inside the house, rooms filled with parents and children in swimsuits. Kids want to know when they can go swimming. Eight o’clock. We go outside. No, they have to wait until nine o’clock. This is official. As the time passes I walk through warm backwaters that are dotted by the slender stumps of dead trees. I can see the lake over the hump of sandy beach. But I can’t swim. I’m not able to swim anymore. M
Gathering the
Lutheran Community in New York City
Lodging for
Servant Trips Youth Ministry Parish Getaways
Clergy Meetings and always
Sacred Hospitality
Convenient ● Comfortable ● Affordable Clergy Discounts
Seafarers & International House
123 East 15th Street New York, NY 10003 212-677-4800
info@sihnyc.org www.sihnyc.org
An ELCA mission for seafarers and sojourners, with an 84-room guesthouse in the Union Square neighborhood that facilitates your
while you facilitate ours. God’s Work, Our Hands.
congregational mission Collectively,
March 2012 31
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