We had been locked down for months on end and I hadn't been able to ride my motorcycle for more than 5km from home so of course the first thing we did was jump in the car and head down to our cousins place just outside of Geelong.
On arrival my nephew Harry was all over me, "c'mon lets go for a ride on the motorbikes!" and I needed no more prompting than that.
We wheeled his bike out of the container, a KTM 125SX and his sister's bike, a Husqvarna 250FE and then his Dad's bike and my favourite to ride, a Yamaha WR450.
All the bikes were ready and we started doing a few laps around the block which has Rugby posts for footy practice and a good sized oval area of fairly flat grass to blast around.
Harry's sister Mallory offered me some MX boots, jacket helmet and gloves, but as I was just scrapping around the yard I only donned the helmet and gloves and started getting the bikes ready to go. I was wearing shorts, a t-shirt and ankle style desert boots.
I have been riding motorcycles for ever, since I was four years old in fact, and have had thousands of hours in the saddle, on dirt, on the road, a little bit of track day stuff and have toured large parts of Australia by motorcycle, so this just seemed completely normal to me.
A few minutes later Harry was practicing wheelies getting chased by the dog and I was lapping behind him, doing power wheelies down the straight bit, foot down turnaround at the goal posts and repeat.
It was so great to be riding a dirt bike again!
Same bike, same person, even less protection a few months earlier doing exactly the same thing.
Except that last wheelie.
I had too much gas, and the bike was going too fast, I could see the tree-strewn fence coming at me way too quickly, so I decided to tap the rear brake with my right foot, chuck my left leg out, cross the bars up as the front wheel came down and power slide around the corner before hitting the trees. Normal stuff on a dirt bike.
But it was grass, and dusk has settled so there was a hint of dew and both wheels slid uncontrollably as the front came down.
My left leg was out trying to control the slide but it got jammed between the gear change and kickstand, and then stuck in the mud.
The bike spun around, but it was too late - my foot was jammed and there was nowhere for it to go.
There was a crunch of metal and bone sounds, and an imaginary bright flash of light enveloped my awareness before everything went deathly quiet and I was on the ground, bike on top of me.
I didn't hit my head, and I didn't black out. But I knew something was badly wrong.
I looked down to see my foot laying on the ground in my desert boot but it wasn't connected to my leg anymore.
My leg bones were half stuck in the ground, and half sticking up in the air.
'That does not look good' I thought to myself. There was a lot of blood.
I tried to move but the bike had pinned me to the ground. Harry was making his way over but I managed to yell at him "Don't! Get ya mum I've broke. my leg, need an ambulance", as I really didn't want him to see this at 12 years old.
He sped off and I looked down again as best I could.
I could see my foot connected by some tendons that looked twisted, twisted like candy cane holding on by skin and tenuous lumps of mushy stuff, so I picked up the boot with my foot still in it and tried to turn it around a few times, vainly trying to make it more normal by straightening it out, but that was too weird.
I was holding my foot in my hands separately to my body. I put my foot back down on the ground, next to my leg. There was blood everywhere now and I couldn't move.
'I might just die in a paddock today', I thought to myself as I lay face down, and started practicing some deep breathing techniques I'd learned in martial arts as a kid.
"Clear your mind, focus on the colour white, breathe in slowly, hold, and breathe out at the same speed." I heard Sensei Gary McCrae say in my head.
'I just ripped my foot off' I thought.
It was clean off.
My left foot was laying inside my stupid desert boot next to me me not connected to my leg except for a few tendons and a bit of skin.
'Did I just become an amputee?'
This is not good, I knew that much, but there was nothing I could do. Nothing.
I was pinned to the ground, and although there wasn't any pain as such, I knew I was bleeding a lot and my leg was stuck in the ground. My foot, torn off, was changing colour and I didn't know what to do about it.
I hadn't blacked out or lost consciousness at all so I figured that was a good sign of not dying. So I just lay there and waited.
Time slowed down to a crawl. Everything was happening in slow motion.
I thought about what I had already been through in my life, the drama, losing my parents, the MS diagnosis, and what this was going to mean. Everything was flashing through my mind as I lay there. I couldn't think of anything good at all.
'I'm glad my parents aren't alive right now because I don't want to put them through what is to come...'
'Oh fuck, I won't be able to work! How will I help Scotty my partner of almost 20 years and FUCK ME will I ever ride a motorbike again?' were just a few of the things flickering through my mind.
'Block it out, just focus on breathing. In, out. The colour white. Stay awake, don't black out. Don't die. There is too much left to do.'
I just lay there, bleeding, pinned to the ground, unable to do anything. It was strangely peaceful.
Sia (the kids Mum) Jasmine, Mallory and Harry had come back and people were starting to run out of the house to see what had happened, but I didn't really know.
I began clawing at the grass in front of me, like a wombat digging a hole or some mad shit, I'd grab handfuls of grass and clench my fingers into a fist.
It made me feel better.
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