Motorcycling – it ’ s a hell of an addiction , isn ’ t it ? Once it sinks its hooks into you , you ’ re done . Drug addictions have nothing on motorcycling – and I know because I have been addicted to drugs . I have been addicted to many things . Drugs , gambling , fighting , strippers , food – I have used and abused them all without a single thought for my own well-being or any consideration for my family or friends . I am , as you can certainly guess , a hugely flawed creature . In many ways I am strong . In many other ways I am weak . And in almost all those ways , I am not all that different to every other man on this earth . I am , and I feel this is both a great curse and great blessing , a man of powerful passions . This is probably my crazy wog blood singing to me . When I love , I love with every fibre of my being . I love unconditionally and totally , without a single reservation . And when I hate , then I hate with a vitriol and intensity terrifying to observe . My hate is pitiless , unending , and implacable . My love is blind , absolute , and unreserved . I am , as my wife has often observed , a friend without equal and an enemy without mercy . And while I wage an endless war within myself to find some workable balance between these two things , I have never once considered giving up motorcycles . That ship has sailed , and that soul has been sold . I regret nothing . Motorcycling has given me a life so rich in experience and emotion , I will never be able to understand why everyone isn ’ t doing it . That such a simple , easy-to-attain thing – two wheels , an engine , and handlebars , controlled by vague spatial awareness and basic motor skills – can provide a man with such a wealth of pleasure , will always astonish me . Like every other rider , I have been wet , cold , miserable , hot , terrified and exalted . Unlike every other rider , I have persisted . I have maintained and fed the passion and rage that first drew me to bikes , and I have never once resiled from it . I can ’ t . It has almost killed me countless times , and yet I persist in some kind of selfish self-pandering way which I struggle to explain to people who don ’ t share this addiction . My son , whom I love with every fibre of my being , first evinced an interest in riding motorcycles at around the age of 16 . I had neither encouraged him to , or discouraged him from riding bikes until that time – figuring