Tandem Anyone?

I met the most fascinating couple recently. Trim, grey-headed, and glowing with good health, they road into town on their tandem recumbent bicycle. A brief conversation revealed that they began recreational bicycle touring following retirement and have crisscrossed the US multiple times in the time since. Their current ride was a large loop beginning and ending at home in Tennessee with travel up and across Kentucky, down to the Natchez Trace in Tennessee, then across Alabama. Their gentle good nature was absolutely charming. I wanted to climb on Lil’ Red and ride right along with them.

Handsome husband (HH) and I have already talked about long distance bicycling in relation to our future retirement plans. We would love to complete a west to east coast tour. But frankly, despite my conversation with the charming Tennessee Twosome, and despite the fact that we own a tandem (Big Red), I can’t see us spending retirement on a tandem bike.

Do I really want to spend retirement looking at HH’s butt? Sure, in passing, a glance here and there, it’s a fine behind. But, day after day, rain or shine, mile after mile, spandex-clad buns as my primary view?

These are critical questions that a retirement planner can’t answer. He or she is only interested in discussing if we will have enough money to retire. I already know the answer to that – NO! None-the-less, we plan to go ahead and do it anyway. We’ve never let the lack of appropriate financing get in the way of any other life decision. Heck, if we’d waited until we could afford it, we wouldn’t have three kids. Three kids with darn fine teeth (braces), adequate educations, and pleasant memories of family vacations that we couldn’t afford. That’s right kids, pack your suitcases, we’re going on a guilt trip. Did I mention the hours of hard labor. OK…I admit that with #3 it was minutes of hard labor…but don’t slow me down, I’m on a roll here. Our financial planning for retirement has its own acronym: MOTK, Mooch Off The Kids.

Once again, I’ve digressed from the actual story: retirement on a tandem bike. Back to business, we’ve got the butt issue as the number one consideration. I think that issue could be manageable if I could figure out a way to Velcro a book to his rear, so that I could read as we rode.

Issue number two: steering. The uninformed bystander might think that steering on a tandem is a no-brainer, after all, only one rider has the capacity to turn the bike – the front rider. Let me tell you, the phrase Back Seat Driver was invented for tandem bicyclists. I consider it an important part of my job as “stoker” (the rear cyclist) to gasp at real (and imagined) road obstacles, lean right or left to indicate when and where I think we should turn, and verbally assist HH in his steering responsibility. Somehow he just doesn’t appreciate all the effort I put into carrying out this task. There is this certain set to his jaw that tells me he isn’t happy. All wives know THAT set of the jaw. So… do we really want to spend retirement risking TMJ from HH’s clenching his teeth? If he could only r-e-l-a-x and listen.

Issue number three involves stopping and coasting. You see, most bicyclists have a dominant foot that they unconsciously place on the ground when stopped, and a favored foot position when coasting (i.e. not peddling). HH and I are exact opposites on this. When cycling solo, I stop right foot down, HH left. When coasting (my favorite bicycling activity), I have the crank in a vertical position with one foot at 12 o-clock and one at 6 o-clock, HH is a horizontal coaster. I think it must be some stone-age throwback to his childhood coaster brake bicycling days. I don’t know that we can overcome issue number three. In fact, I think this should have been covered in the premarital counseling – horizontal coasters really shouldn’t marry vertical coasters if they ever expect to tandem.

My imagination flashes 20 years into the future, to the sight of Steve and I disembarking from Big Red should we decide to follow in the footsteps of the Tennessee Twosome. Instead of being trim and glowing with good health, I somehow see us rumpled, sweating, sunburned, and bickering:
“I thought you said that you put the map in the bike bag.” (HH)
“You know that it’s your job to keep track of the map. After all you’re the brains, I’m just the brawn in this operation” (me)
“Brawn, brawn?! You call that brawn? You’re back there reading a book?!” (HH)
“I only quit peddling that one time. It was an exciting point in the plot…you see the detective..” (me)
HH interrupts, “That ONE TIME?? That one time was the entire state of Utah!”
“It’s a skinny state, it could have been worse. So where are we?” (me)
“How do I know where we are? We don’t have a map anymore.” (HH)
“Well, you could ask someone.” (me)
“I would, but my jaw hurts.” (HH)

No, I admire the Tennessee Twosome, and wish them the best of luck, but I think HH and I had better spend our golden years on separate bicycles, MOTK.