On Being a Fat White Guy

On my way back into Cleveland from Easter dinner, my parents' minivan stopped at a red light on Carnegie. Behind us we could hear a motorcycle being revved, and giggling, but could not see the rider. At one point, he yelled: "Look Ma, no hands!"

He eventually pulled ahead of us, oozing his utter delight at being On A Motorcycle, the symbol of male independence and badassery the world over. He was fat, blond, balding and wearing a beret to cover it, and his jeans and jacket labeled him as suburban.

I made a few assumptions about his personality, relationships, earning level, and job satisfaction, and felt simultaneously saddened and irritated--the motorcycle was not going to break any spiral of suburbanism he might have been trying to break out of, was not going to change his personality from that of an investment banker, was not going to attract some kinky chick with fake tits. He was the kind of person, I decided, who would say my bike with special emphasis, begging people to ask him about it so that he could inflate his experiences and plans. In a few months, I surmised, the bike would be placed in the corner of his garage, his SUV would come out for everyday use, and he would probably tell himself he was "too busy" to ride it when in fact he just didn't actually like it that much. I know people for whom Harley-Davidson is something approaching a religion, and though I disagree with them, I felt insulted on their behalf--how dare some, some poser besmirch their passion?

But how else do you learn? What other way do you find your true passion, than trying on a bunch for size and rejecting them?

It occurs to me that people who often give others the benefit of the doubt do not make good writers. Being strongly opinionated is far more interesting. So he's just a fat white guy, laughable, searching for his next purchase to make him feel less like the man he was destined to be but never wanted to be, and he's sad and won't admit it and that's the end.