Wheels

Wheels

My fascination with wheels or objects bearing wheels must have started when I got my first tricycle. I was somewhere around 5. I might have been pushed in some contraption like a buggy before then but that escapes my memory. Bicycle - age 10. Somewhere between tricycle and bicycle I was introduced to roller skates–those nifty ones that you clamped onto your shoes. I mean shoes, too; sandals didn’t do the job. I still have a skate key, if you are old enough to remember them. But no skates. A side note....if you have a skate key you became pretty popular. Skate keys were the first things lost and the last things found. A neighbor had the skates to envy. Shoe skates. Hers were white boots just like the roller rink had. She had little pom pom deals attached to hers. Oh, my.

Mr. Lucky understood this thing I have for wheels. He went to a yard sale once and came back with a tricycle (rusty and quite wonderful), a Radio Flyer wagon, and a wheel barrow. (I had to look this up...wheel barrel or wheel barrow. It’s barrow). What a guy. On Mother’s Day on year I got a new wheel barrow. Another time I got a lawn mower with 4 wheels. Oh boy.

Moving along.... I didn’t marry Mr. Lucky because he had a 1960 Studebaker Lark, but it didn’t hurt his image either. Most importantly he introduced me to motorcycles. Have you ever heard of a Tohatsu? That’s what he put me on first. It had wheels. Later I moved up to a thing of beauty. A 1970 Yamaha Enduro 175. It’s still in the garage. One of the last times I rode it, it threw me on the ground between a rock and a really hard place. As I recall there was a kelly hump and a mammoth tree stump involved, too.

After witnessing me hitting the ground Mr. Lucky thought (wisely) that it was time to switch to four-wheelers. Better still. More WHEELS. So far it appears that I am lots less likely to get thrown to the ground while riding my 4-wheeler.

The yard sale wagon was the start of my collection of wagons. Most of them are rusty, but well loved. However a few years back my son sent me one for my birthday. It’s a beauty, complete with pneumatic tires, removable wood side boards, and much too nice for kids to play with. Every grown woman should have one. The wheel barrow thing just sort of happened. I have used both the wagons and wheel barrows for planters as well as for hauling stuff about in the yard.

As you can imagine I have assorted wheel barrows and wagons scattered about in flower beds and former flower beds. Oh, yeah...and one rusty tricycle. I call it Yard Art.

I’m on the hunt for a kiddie car just in case you have one to give away. I wouldn’t turn away any Tonka trucks, either.

Shortly after I wrote the first final draft of this piece (from the valley) I went out for my "health walk" during which I fell to the ground in fine style. That would be with an audience and I certainly wasn’t disappointed. With little fanfare Mr. Lucky took me to the ER for x-rays. I was sure I had broken my patella or tibia or some other hard to pronounce part of my anatomy. No. Just a torn ACL. The L part stands for ligament. Long story short. Now I get to use a walker (with wheels) until I get better.

Man, I love wheels.