Wear a helmet. Just wear one.

My next door neighbor Troy got a new motorcycle a couple of months ago.
He's ridden his whole life but took the last couple of years off.

When I got home from work Saturday morning he was riding down our
street without a helmet. He seemed to be having a blast.

Last night about 11ish my son bolted into the living room saying that
he'd heard a noise outside. I went outside with a flashlight to
investigate. There seemed to be something going on in front of the
next house so I went over to get a closer look. I dudcked back in for
a second to say it was nothing to worry about, then went back out.

Troy had hit my other next door neighbor's SUV from behind at a decent
speed. His motorcycle was laying in the road all busted up. Glass was
everywhere and I was bare footed. The guy across the street was in his
PJs holding a towel over Troy. Troy was bleeding. A lot. His wife and
his brother were standing nearby holding each other, just kinda
stunned.

Troy was busted up bad. He was bleeding bad from a few places on his
head, his leg was bent funny and his speech was slurred. He kept
trying to get up saying nothing was wrong, so I kept him down. He said
his leg hurt so we shifted him on his side and he seemed to feel
better. I took the towel and bunched it up on the side of his head to
keep the flow of blood down. I took his bike gloves off to make more
comfortable. He wanted something to drink but I wouldn't let them give
him anything because we didn't know what was broken inside.

The ambulance came about 15 minutes later. The put him on a back board
and locked down his head. Luckily he was inside the ambulance before
the news crews showed up so they couldn't get a shot of his face. The
ambulance pulled away I went inside.

Mary was waiting at the end of our driveway. I told her what happened
as we went in.

In the light I noticed that I had Troy's blood on my hands and arms.
When I washed up Mary thought it was mine.

Troy's family was at the hospital all day so we didn't get any news on
him. But the newscasts tonight said that his injuries weren't life
threatening.

When we went out today the pavement was stained where he laying. There
had been a lot of blood.

If he had been wearing a helmet he may have walked away from the accident.