PEDAL POWER

PEDAL POWER

I swapped my dear old friend, the Raleigh

For a super duper darling electric blue

Assisted pedal

Guaranteed to spare the legs

Makes pushing uphill a pleasure

 

Handed over my money with barely a quibble

Thinking techno age – wonderful!

 And in the cycle lane down Bradley Way

I’ll swanking it a bit

Be the envy of my seventy-somethings compatriots’

 

Fully charged and on my way

Cheerful and happy as a lamb with two mothers

Plans to coffee at Costa Cafey

And have a natter and a swagger

 

Blue flashing light

Caught my peripheral vision

It’ll be the Broadband pipe fixer uppers

Or the gas line fitters

 I blithely figured

 

Hair blowing (figuratively) in the wind

Fifteen miles the bicycle shop assured

I give my E Bike her maiden voyage head.

She thrust forward like a cruise ship

Steaming up Foyle Estuary

 

Without a helmet to cover my hearing aid

The wailing siren of the PSNI

Got my courtesy

Where was my theory test certificate?

The licence I got when I wore the helmet and leathers?

Leathers, son?  I said coyly

That’s a story for another day

Don’t think they’d fit me now, anyway

 

Where’s my registrations number?

And insurance and tax for my motor?

Where would I put them, Officer, I quipped

.

Not a smile, not even a quiver of the lips

With your six penalty points, madam

 He dead panned back

 

Not wishing to state the evidence before him

It’s a bicycle, I stated categorically

A motor vehicle, I think you’ll find

That’ll be £1000 pound fine—

 

I was longing for my dear old Raleigh

And thinking of the miles we’d travelled

A thousand pound fine!

I arched my brow

 Assisted vehicles –

Not permitted on cycle lane at Bradley Way

He’d got me there

That made him smile

 

Costa coffee seemed a distant dream

I’d need every penny to pay the DVA.

He closed his notebook with a grin

It’s a Northern Ireland, thing, he smiled.

Gemma Hill 2017©