That's Shitty

People seem to be impressed when I tell them that I race BMX. That I’ve raced for decades and years and that I’m old as dirt.

  

As if there’s something sexy and impressive about a middle aged man with arrested development and spritely energy engaging in a kid’s sport.

 

But the uninformed masses don’t realize that, at its heart, BMX is a pretty white trash sport.  If I google images of “trash BMX”, I can have my pick of what I’m talking about.  If you thrown in the term “Florida” as well, you get a treasure trove of great images.

 

And where I live in Georgia isn’t much different.

 

At some point I realized I was much better at running my mouth, entertaining people at the races and announcing than I ever was going to be as a rider.

 

A few years ago, I went to my local track which was tucked away in a rural pocket of south Atlanta.  This track had taken to racing at nights, which I liked since it made things cooler in the waning summer heat.  I would come and ride for free in exchange for running my mouth and bringing what limited skills I have to their BMX party.  A fair swap, if you ask me. 

I had gotten into the habit of driving my Honda Civic around the track and facilities and parking it directly underneath the 25 foot announcing tower along the last straight away to save me from lugging all my clothing and bikes over there.  I would back up to the fence, put my bike together and make the whole announcer’s tower area into my area. 

 

On this night in August, a new family to BMX set up next to me about 10 feet down the way.  They had one son racing who was about 6 years old.  And they had two other sons aged about 2 and three.  What stuck me was that the two younger boys were both wearing nothing by diapers and a t-shirt.  They were filthy, covered in the Georgia red clay.  And they were both WELL beyond the age when kids should be wearing diapers and nothing else in public.  Welcome to Georgia, folks!

 

Their parents seemed to not even know they were there as they were focused on their oldest spawn’s BMXcapades and nothing else.

The race time approached and I settled into announcer mode.  The two dirty troglodytes noticed me walking up and down the stairs and me announcing over the PA system, and this seemed to intrigue them a bit.  I’m known for my shock and awe antics over the microphone.

I announced and ran my mouth as usual and all was well when my nose was assaulted with the most vile, unclean abomination I’ve ever smelled.  I looked on the bottom of both my shoes as the smell was clearly inspired by Satan’s ass hole.  I’d not stepped in shit.

 

I heard light giggling from behind me at the door to the announcing tower and I saw both young boys with their heads poking through it.  As soon as they saw me notice them, they started sliding on their asses down the wooden stair case. 

 

When I looked outside to see them making a getaway, I noticed that both of their once clean diapers were covered in a much, MUCH darker brown on the ass that had spread like a huge black eye.  Yep…both “toddlers” had shitty, full diapers. And their parents couldn’t have cared less.  Over the course of the night, the boys climbed the stairs again and again, always announcing themselves to my nose long before they started giggling.  It sucked to be assaulted by their WMD asses before they interrupted my announcing with their noises.

The race progressed and we got to the one scheduled break.  I had to go to the bathroom, so I turned on the music and went to exit the tower.  When I left the tower, I looked down at my car that was directly below me.  Perched atop my roof, sitting between the two rails of my roof mounted bike rack on my bright red car were two semi-nude, shitty bottomed boys.  They had climbed atop my car from the rear bumper with their dirty, bare feet, they had sat between the rails for my two bikes and each had an arm propped on the bike rack as if to say leisurely, “Just another boring night at the BMX track!”

 

I was awestruck.  A mere 10 feet away their parents sat talking to their other son who was racing.  How could the mom and dad (who looked to be about 25-ish, and of inbred, small town stock) not know their kids were defacing my car with their shitty, mud covered diapers and feet!?  Then again…they tolerated and seemed oblivious to the stench, so what could I really argue?

I went down and asked the mom (red-neck dads have a notoriously short fuse) if she could help me get her kids off my car.  She acted embarrassed and as if she were going to whoop them.  I could see that she clearly didn’t care all that much.  I figured it wouldn’t do me any good to blow my top…it would only run a family away from my sport that I love so much. 

The race concluded, the circus packed up and we all filed out of the community park.  I had to get gas on my way home, so I stopped at a QT for gas and a taquito which was my post race ritual.

I stood there in the late summer humidity and heat pumping gas, and I could SWEAR I still smelled the shitty diapers of those two kids.  I inspected my armpits, which were innocent of the offence.  My next thought was that the smelly boys were up in the tower so much that their stench somehow got embedded into the very fibers of my hair and my clothing. 

I checked my clothing and I was clear in that area, too.  I resigned this to being one of those mysteries that remained unsolved, like the Loch Ness Monster, or Area 51 when I went to go re-rack the gas nozzle.

And that’s when I saw it.  That’s when I saw THEM.

Glaring off the arc-sodium lights of the QT were the two very distinct dirty scratch marked trails that indicated that the boys used my rear window, my trunk and my bumper for their very own shit-n-slide.  The rocks and dirt ground into their moist, feces filled diapers had left scratches that remain there unto this day (I eventually sold that car to a boss I work with) on my window and on my trunk.

The worst of all this was that the “mud” still on my window was a diabolical mixture of shit, dirt, sweat and what appeared to be urine.  And that’s what I kept smelling.

I stopped by a car wash on the way home to get that stew off my car, all the time livid.  I vowed to confront those horrible parents when I saw them again at the track, but they never came back.  But in reality, what could I say?

So, if you meet me (or anyone for that matter) who tells you they race BMX, don’t be all that impressed.  There are the rare few gems out there…but you’ll come across quite a few lumps of shit…er, lumps of coal out there doing this kind of stuff before you get to the good.

 

I’m a BMXican fo’sho!