Slow Motion Wipe Out: The Day Fear Took the Wheel

In November of 2014 I took a slide on my Vespa in a gravel parking lot. I was going slow but turned my wheel as I braked to pull into a parking spot. Somewhere in there seems to lie the issue.

One minute I was upright, the next I was pinned half under my scoot, one shoe missing, gravel pressing into my leg and very confused about how I got there. For me it was lightning quick. For my husband, who was following behind me; it was a slow motion wipe out. To this day I think he was trying not to laugh but he won't confess so I will never know.

He carefully pulled in behind me and jumped to my aid as did another bystander who witnessed the whole thing. Nothing appeared to broken although my pinned foot had begun to swell in the heel area. My pride was darn near smashed to pieces, however. It was so embarrassing but the relief at my scoot and my body being ok made up for it.  When we were ready to leave I felt some anxiousness at driving on the gravel out of the parking lot but managed to depart without incident.

I parked my scooter and some time went by before I rode again and when I did, I didn't enjoy it. Not at all. In fact, I was afraid and anxious. I didn't want to fall again or get into an accident. As time passed my fear grew. By August of 2015 I had all but decided to sell my Vespa, much to my husband's dismay. I was really struggling with not being able to dissect my fall in my mind so I could avoid it happening again. It just happened so fast I could not figure out the point at which I made the mistake that led to the slide.

Bill had discovered Scoot Pensacola and we were planning to attend their scooter UNrally in October but I was very reluctant to go. I had lost all joy and fun in scooting and really wanted to sell my scoot. I did not believe I could enjoy it no matter what Bill said. Almost at the last minute I agreed to go with the understanding that if I felt like I didn't want to participate I could go shopping or meet up with friends and not ride. Our mid-life joint crisis was about to come to an end.

The UNrally turned out to be a game changer for me, but that's another blog. I also got bogged down in sand and fell over but that's another blog, too. Stay tuned and don't forget to subscribe!

Safe scootin, y'all!

Robin

A Muse and a Mid-Life Crisis

It's been several years since our scooter-muse first zipped up into our driveway, and it wasn't really too long after that day that my husband began to ponder the idea of scooting around on two wheels ourselves. Jenn lived a few doors down from us, and nearly every day we would see her scooting by our house on her way here and there, sometimes blowing her horn and waving. Other times she would scoot into the driveway and stop for a chat. All the while an idea was forming in the back of my husband's mind, an idea that would change our lives quite a bit later on.

The McNews and our Scooter Muse-Jenn!

Out of the blue one day Bill told me that since we were getting close to mid-life crisis age we ought to buy scooters and have a mid-life crisis together. After I finished laughing hysterically at him I realized he was not joking. He had already been on the internet pricing them out and felt we could pick a couple of scooters up fairly cheap. Fifty CC scooters didn't require a motorcycle endorsement so we could ride those initially, and if we liked it we could move on to something larger after we got our endorsements. I even surprised myself when I realized I was game.


 Fast forward a few weeks and we had Tweety Bird, a neon yellow Chinese scooter, 150cc, and a red 50cc TaoTao. After getting our motorcycle endorsements we began to ride. And we really LIKED it!

I only have this pic, no Tweety pics.

As a matter of fact, we liked riding so much we began to look at upgrading to faster, more durable scoots. Bill did his research and felt Vespas were the way to go.We saved and searched for the best deals. Actually Bill did because he became a man obsessed! We got rid of the red 50cc and bought Bill's Vespa first, a beautiful chocolate brown  GTV 300. Mine was acquired shortly after, a gorgeous candy apple red Vespa GTS 300. At this point, the fun REALLY began! And we sold Tweety to a young man who really needed transportation. Win/Win!

Beautiful day to ride at the St. Andrews Marina!

We rode our scoots everywhere! First on back roads only and for the most part we avoid busy main roads even today.  The ride is always better if it's slow enough to take in smells, sights and sounds anyway, and on busy roads it's hard to do that. The level of alertness you have to maintain on busy roads is tiring as well. We were always driving on guard and defensively. In spite of that I had an "incident" involving only myself that shook us both up pretty good and almost ended my scooting for good.

But that's another blog.

Which I will be writing soon so make sure you subscribe to this blog for future posts and check out Panama City Scoots on Facebook and Instagram!


Til next time-safe scooting!

Robin