THE ART OF DODGING GAMMAS My experience of the dog days of summer feels like a dog with a dry bowl. So I hydrate with "So Be" and gallons of spring and distilled water. I can hardly appreciate being in intense sun for long on those ozone-hole-days. It's x-rays, gamma rays, and ultra color spectrum wave lengths that get to me. I put on sunblock but the sun can turn me to toast, wearing me down, inside out. Nevertheless, yesterday, a Sunday in the sun, I perused the celebrated Summer Festival of the Arts hosted at Youngstown State University. Sixty-one artists displayed for sale their wares from ceramics to oil paintings, jewelry to original furniture. I imagine the lemonade stand did some of the best business. The fine art artists are struggling. I mingled and was encouraging when I could be. However I chose to enjoy more of the free and indoor cultural events as much as possible. A harp soloist played celestially in the central gallery of the grand Butler Museum of Art. The last piece strummed and plucked was Debussy's "Clare de Lune", a reverie in melody for me especially on a harp. The Opera Guild scholarship recipients sang their little hearts out to Mozart, Bottesini, Schubert, and Straus. They did quite well but the one who won the lesser prize moved me the most, her sensitive interpretation truely sweet and pure. I had brought my Cocoa Grows screenplay along to work but I didn't get to it until the USA Dance troupe performed. They did the usual demonstrations of the Rhumba, Cha Cha, Fox Trot, Jitterbug. But I wrote while they danced and came up with a great line in my script only tangentially related to the dancing. Outside I wrote too few precious words while sitting on a bench under tall oaks by the fountain, half-watching a wood carver carving a two foot by seven-foot tree stump into a penguin standing on blocks of ice, while an amplified Irish band drowned out the wood carver's chain saws and power sander. It's distracting -- hard to create while other arts activities flourish all around. Still, it must have been inspiring. Last night I stayed up well past two a.m. writing. Fiinally I went to sleep smiling, pleased with the day's progress.

THE BICYCLE AS A WEAPON
by H.M. Johnquest

Two ways I know to utilize a standard-issue pedal metal bicycle as a survival weapon.

First, a former employer, a genuis with patents and millions and a good atttitude, relayed to me a dramatic practique he deployed in a time of extreme need. It happened when this old boss and his wife were bicycling through a park on the near east side of Cleveland, Ohio.

What's right with this picture? He's married to his high school sweetheart. Their kids are grown and doing fine. They absolutely love and trust each other and love life. She handles the books and he handles the inventions. Things can only get better.

On this particular day, life seemed to be going by like a walk in the park, except they were riding bikes in the park, when a gang of dogs-gone-wild, street dogs running in a pack, began chasing them, barking, dogging them, hounding them.

Watching him tell the story, I sensed the adrenaline, norepinephrine and all surging behind his eyes all over again. If you were ever chased by a barking dog nipping at your heels, you know how it feels. Picture half-a-dozen canines coming from behind and at both sides and they're dirty, lean-hungry, snarling dogs. Imagine you're with someone you care about very much. Are we there yet? Try and see...

The edge of the park came in sight. They were close but there was a hill to climb. He sent her on ahead, posthaste and he hung back - slowing - to let her get away on up over the hill.

To the dogs he must have looked like a weak old bull lagging behind the herd, ready to be run down and overwhelmed. In life, the thrivers wisely choose their battles and battlegrounds when and where they can, even when it's forced upon them to make a stand. He veered his bike into the open, stopped fast and hard and hopped off.

WARNING to mamzie-pamzie armchair millionaires, do not try this at home! You could easily throw your back out or bring on a heart attack. First off, it is recomended proceedure to alight from the side of the bike from which you observe a lesser number or least ferocious of the dogs attacking. This he did. Next, hit dog(s) with bike. Repeat. Move bike as shield. Swing bike as needed and/or in a continuous circle round and round. He did this. Keep moving for safety. Be aggressive but take it easy; you may need to ratchet it up a notch to effectively thwack and creditably execute fell swoops so as to continually collide with the lunging, darting dog snouts. [When handy, a padalock on a chain may be considered a formidable accessory.] Although this instance of dog-bashing was minor, the dogs slunk away for easier prey.

That was that. Happy ending. Hugs and kisses. Police were dispatched. There had been other reports on these dogs. This one was their last.

The second practique in the fight for life with a bike is in my experience. I bike a lot. I go for groceries with a big back pack. I ride the bike to the libriary, to yoga, tai chi, to buy vitamin C, E, bee pollen, almonds, organic produce, pure water and whatnot. (I buy loads less whatnot traveling by bike.) So here's my death defying, life enhancing, bike-as-weapon story. Blink and you'll miss it. It took a dozen bikes and decades of riding for me to achieve this. I'm 56. My blood pressure is 109 over 63 (that's good), my cholesterol is low and my spirits are set for soaring.

I choose life by beating back death with a bicycle. Every day it's life or death on the road; I keep choosing life. Because I'm in tip-top shape and experienced, if I see a pack of wild dogs coming at me, I think I'll climb a tree. Enjoy the view.

c.2007, H.M.J.