From back when I lived in Hollywood.



"Hey man, spare a dollar for a brother biker?”
I look up to see an grimy bum decked out in full H.O.G. attire. I offer him a smoke, but have no intention of parting with real money. He starts telling me his hard luck story. He’s been homeless for about a six months. Lost the job, lost the wife, lost the house. Now he’s cruising around the Southwest on his Harley. And he just needs a few bucks to fill the tank, and get to the next town. This I have to see. We walk around the corner to look at his bike.

It is the sorriest, beat-to-death, early '90s Softtail I have ever seen. Frayed cables, dented sheet metal, bald tires over bent rims. There is a slow and steady drip out of the primary. It smells strange, too. Not in the normal “burnt oil” way. He offers to sell me his tool kit for twenty bucks. It has some nice Snap-On wrenches, but Harleys are standard, and these tools are all metric. Still, it is getting on Christmas . . . might as well do my good deed for the year. I tell him, I live a block away.

I take him back to my garage to give him a quart of oil. I catch a momentary sneer on his face as he sees my Victory. I see his lips form the words “Jap bike”. As I fix the throttle cable he tells me he’s just waiting for the money from his "slip and fall lawsuit" against KFC to come through.

I swear every bum in L.A. has a lawsuit in the works.

An hour goes by fixing little things. We compare notes on riding, women and how we both have been in serious accidents. He asks if I have any of the pain pills left? I tell him "it’s been nice to meet you," and start shooing him out the door.

As he rides away, I think . . . "At least it’s better than a shopping cart".