Not all finds are in the barn

Charley could feel his hand brush against his right thigh as he walked across the kitchen, grabbed the keys off the hook with his left hand and dropped them in his coat pocket. He pushed on the left-hand glove by sliding his hand into it on the counter and then shoving it under his right armpit. With the same motion and step forward he then pushed down on the door handle and pushed the screen door open with his left shoulder. The back steps creaked as they got crushed under the weight of his work boots stomping down them and transitioned into a saunter-ly gallop towards the old red barn behind the house.

His right leg would get lifted and kicked out by his right thigh and land on the sole of his right boot and then he would cantilever over to his left leg and his left boot would kick off from sole to toe to take his next step. He strode across the backyard swinging his arm with each stride and his unfilled sleave was closed with a safety pin and flapped in the wind.

The coon hound greeted him bolting out from inside the gap of the double-wide front barn doors. His gangly three legs pushed his skin-draped skeleton up the tractor ruts towards his comparable master. He had lost his front right leg in a steel trap when he was only a pup and Charlie refused to put him down. His dad had given him a disgusted look “who’s going to take care of him? His legs coming off and then he’ll be a three-legged hunting dog. That’s no use to anyone, better off letting him go now.” He pushed Charlie aside by the side of his head and raised his rifle to take point-blank aim.

“No, he’s my dog, I’ll take care of him.” Charley had jumped to his feet and pushed his father’s rifle skyward. He could feel his father’s strength as he tried to push down and get his aim back. “OK, fine. But he will be your responsibility.” Charlie and his dad held a steely long stare at each other before his dad exhaled. “Come on you grab him and pulled his leg out, I’ll push the trap open.” The dog had been howling and pulling on the chain tethered trap the whole time, so it was Charlie who now had to grab the dog, which was about the same size as his teenage body, while hid dad pushed down on the clips that held the steel teeth jaws onto the hound's broken leg.

When Charley came home from the hospital, the hound was the first one to greet him when he had come home, bolting off the front porch and across the front lawn. Now he followed him everywhere and would not let out of his sight.

“Come on buddy let’s go” Charlie rubbed his ears and stroked his neck gently pushing him to his left. He fell in behind his master as he continued up to the barn door and pushed it open, first with his left hand and then his right shoulder. The night air rushed past him like a gasp or exhale from an old man who had just been woke. The roof was slowly creaking from the sunlight beginning to gently heat the metal sheeting. Light came straight in from the open front doors. During this time of year and for the rest of the summer the sun would rise and shine into the open barn doors. As the sun rose higher it would shine through the missing slates or cracks in the walls and roof.

The shape of the barn peak was what caught the sunlight first. A sheet of golden dawn had gotten caught on the edge and was being drawn down over the roof and across the front face. The barn looked like it had one eye open with the top left loft door open and pursed sideways lips with the two-story double barn doors cracked open leaving a gap. The faded rusty red face glowed softly. Charlies great grandfather had painted it when the farm was a working dairy. Linseed oil, old milk, blood, and rust had been blended and mopped on the outer boards. The wood had soaked it in, and the sun had baked it on. As you looked at the great old barn you would begin to lean to the left to align yourself with it and make it straight in your mind.

Charlie pulled on the beaded chain that hung from the long fluorescent light that stretched across the back corner of the very back corner of the old barn. He pulled on three more chains lighting the whole back corner of the barn that had become his workshop. The lights were parallel with the floor but cut severe angles with the posts and beams. Charley’s square pegboard hung straight from one of the cross beams but cut the perpendicular wall behind it at angles. The grey canvas cloth was molded over the old motorcycle. He grabbed a fistful of canvas and pulled straight back draping it over his right elbow and pulling back over his right shoulder with it and then grabbing another fist full with his left hand again and draping the whole tarp over the horse stall gate.

The 1940 Indian Chief had been his grandfather’s and now was his. The two-tone paint, red and white, was faded and the red was partially bleeding into the white wheel panels. The chrome lights were shiny but pitted and had tangles of red lint from being buffed. The plastic crystals were crazed but the lights when on shone through them and no one could tell. The headlight had been switched out for a double bulb and the Indian horn had been mounted above the headlights so everyone could see it coming down the road.

Granddad had bought this right out of college, brand new. He had been the first to get an education in the family but as soon as he came home with his new motorcycle, Pearl Harbor was bombed. “Damn Japs robbed me” he always said that to Charley’s dad. “Bombed my ears off and took my arm and leg.” He had been a deck officer on a frigate when a Japanese plane crashed into the side of his ship. The concussive force of the impact shattered his eardrums and he had braced himself against the bulkhead by putting his right leg and arm up against them. When the plane hit, almost his entire right side fractured. They removed his right arm from the shoulder down and his right leg was taken off at the hip. For all he knew, his motorcycle was more than useless to him now.

Charley maneuvered around the bike with a smooth chamois cloth. Whipping down the tanks, the seat, handlebars, and the front and rear wheel covers. He removed both gas caps smelling first for gas then rocking the bike and listening for a slosh. He then removed the oil cap and checked the level of the oil. Granddad hadn’t quit when he got home, and the Indian was all the proof to Charley that wounds don’t define you.

The Indians left handlebar had been adapted to control both the timing and the throttle. He had it split so the outer three-quarter portion twisted back and forth for the throttle and the inner quarter was used to adjust the timing. He positioned the timing control so it wasn’t advanced and opened the throttle all the way. He then reached down and opened the fuel valve and the choke. The kick starter had been adapted to have a pronounced peg hole and granddad would stick his peg leg into that slot and force it down with the weight of his body. Charley did this now and he had adapted his boot to have a rear peg on his right foot. He went back and turned the throttle almost all the way down, checked that the timing was not advanced and clicked back the choke to it was mostly up and turned on the key. On the back of the bike, he had a saddlebag and he pulled out what looked like a rounded cup with a half hollow ball as its base. He undid the safety pin on his right sleeve and took the ball end of the cup and slipped it up his sleeve. On either side of the cup were leather straps that he then belted on around his elbow. The hollow half metal ball had been Charley’s granddads that he took off a full arm prosthetic and reattached onto his modern shorted arm. He mounted the Chief, throwing his right leg over the back and making sure his peg boot landed into the kick starter socket. The ball socket fit over a shiny silver ball that was attached to the end of a metal rod that controlled the clutch and Charley moved it back and forth making sure the clutch moved and the ball and socket moved also. The clutch pedal was on the bottom left so he operated that with his left foot as anyone else would.

With a kick up from his left leg, he jumped up and came down on the kick starter with his right boot and got clnk--thwmmppp. He did this three more times in succession. Thwmmppp--clnkk, thwmppp-clnkkk, thwwmmppp-clnkkk, and on the third one the engine compression caught and came to life.

Blllbb bddbll dddbllld drrddbblldrrd rdrdrbbbl llblblb lblb……..

The right handlebar had a round knob that matched the clutch and Charley put the socket into that ball and with his left hand adjusted the throttle to give the machine a low rumble.

“Going out for a ride this morning?” Charley’s dad had made it into the barn and opened the stall gate and was standing in front of him and his machine.

Charley looked up and the hound dozing in the corner jumped up and ran over to lick his hand. “Yeah, just for an early morning ride” he cut the engine off by turning the key as he got off. He walked up to his dad and gave him a left-arm hug, “He’s been itchin for a ride and I want to get him out a couple more times.” He looked down at the old dog who just sat on his hind legs waggin his tail.

“I can’t believe that tripawed critter stays in place so well on the back of that machine.” Dad reached down and petted him with both hands and squeezing his ears against his skull.

“He does alright, it’s like he’s part of the bike when he’s in his seat.” On the back was what had been the bottom half of a metal barrel cut into a quarter section with a cargo net across the front and a round leather pillow for a seat.

“You know you’re gonna have to find a new place for your bike when we replace the barn” his dad was wringing his hands in an old rag, rubbing dirt off his hands from his earlier work.

“I’ve been thinking about that” I paused and waited for him to look up “we’re going to straighten her up, we don’t need to replace her.” He gave me that look again. He didn’t want to lose the old barn either.

“I’m going for a ride and when I get back, we’ll figure out how to straighten her up and give he new life.” I nodded towards the gate and dad stepped back to open it up. The hound jumped into the bucket seat and I restarted the Chief again. We had become the machine together from my grandad's ingenuity and my necessity. I was able to feel the wind in my hair.