By Steve Lita, Editor

I’ve developed a new motorcycle riding technique. I call it: RLAJ, short for Ride Like A Jerk. I may even trademark it. It came to me on a recent trip while riding from Kentucky to New England on a brand-new Kawasaki Voyager. I felt like an Army foot soldier who’d been dropped in the jungle and had to fight his way back to base. It seemed like every mile there were forces of evil trying to take me out. I found myself covering the horn button and more than willing to use it to make my presence known. I was flashing high beams to get drivers’ attention and motioning gestures with my hands at other motorists (although not dirty gestures).

During that trip, I surmised that in this life, sometimes you need to be a jerk to get what you want. Besides, the other motorists seemed to be completely comfortable doing so, except they weren’t doing it for self-preservation like I was. For example, the guy in the little silver sports car who merged onto the highway from an onramp and immediately crossed two lanes, uninterrupted by a head check, because he needs to be in the fast lane, right away. After all, he’s driving a sports car. No need for a glance over his shoulder or a signal light. Not even a need to travel straight for any distance in each lane and change lanes one at a time. Just drift from far right to far left. Only one problem; there’s a Kawasaki Voyager maintaining proper speed in the middle lane. Wow was he surprised when he looked in his mirror and found he nearly clipped my front wheel. He wanted that fast lane though, and he was going to be a jerk and get it any way possible. After all, he’s driving a sports car. What’s so hard about doing a simple head-check? After all, they’re free! Take two.

And then there was the lady talking on her cellphone while tailgating me in her 8000-pound SUV. I’m sure whatever the conversation entailed was much more important than paying attention to how close she was to my rear wheel. She was so close I could read the logo on her cellphone in my rearview mirror. Was my hand gesture for her to back off cause enough to make people consider me a jerk? Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care. I’ll do it again in a minute, and I’ve found myself doing so much more lately.

Now I’m not advocating riding a motorcycle like a jerk for no reason whatsoever, especially for the reason of just being a jerk. But if returning home to your loved ones after a day out on a bike ride is what you want, then go ahead and be a jerk, in a good way. Do you have a flashing headlight modulator on your bike? I’ve never been a fan of those, but now I say, go ahead, flash to your heart’s content. I’ve also never been overly eager to beep my horn. Wouldn’t want to be rude, now would I? But from now on, I’m going to buy spare horns by the gross because I’m not afraid of wearing them out. Any bike I ride that’s equipped with auxiliary driving light will have them glaring all the time. And flashing the brakelight is a mandatory activity you need to learn if you want to RLAJ. If we all do our part to RLAJ, then maybe the motoring public will look out for us as much as we have to watch out for them.

Contrary to popular motorcycling wisdom, I’m not going to ride like I’m invisible. I plan to make myself visible to those who don’t care I’m there. Shamefully there seems to be more and more of that type on the road these days. One of my favorite RLAJ actions is when I pass a car, I do my head check, and then firmly point at the lane I’m taking. I leave no doubt in anyone’s mind as to where I’m going and what I’m doing. Am I being a jerk for my gesture? Fine with me. I’ll sleep well tonight knowing that my gesture helped me make it home, so that I may go to sleep tonight, alive.

Taking a bit of wisdom from recent bumper sticker sighting I had to laugh at one I saw while on that trip from Kentucky to Connecticut. The plain black sticker had a reworked line from the movie The Sixth Sense by M. Night Shyamalan. The main character Cole Sear (played by Haley Joel Osment) said “I see dead people.” The bumper sticker read “I see dumb people.” I certainly did.

If you graduate from my new riding skills class you will receive no frame-able 8" x 10" certificate, no wallet-sized ID card, not even a sticker. (Although I may check into having some stickers made soon.) But you will have survived the mean streets another day. So go ahead. Be a jerk. Just don’t be a dick about it. RB