Wear Your Helmet. Jawohl!

Photo shows WWI German helmet I photographed at Liberty Memorial World War I Museum in Kansas City in December. My bike helmet doesn't look that cool, but I bet it's lighter and more comfortable.

Ben had a potential near death experience recently. He reports he was riding a friend's bicycle in Ames, when a car failed to stop before making a right turn directly in front of him. It basically nudged him, forcing an unplanned right turn.

Ben and the friend's bike are fine, but to me, the scary part of the story is that Ben was not wearing a bicycle helmet. My bright boy who is contemplating adding pre-med to his math and biology majors, and who has studied two languages in college, could have lost it all at once.

Yikes.

When I was much younger, in the early 1980s, a sister-in-law of mine was hospitalized with a serious head blow resulting from a close encounter with a street drain cover in Davenport, Iowa. Since she suffered that head trauma, CR Biker has been pretty consistent.

When I bike, I wear a helmet. Just as I would not think of driving a car without wearing a seatbelt, I won't ride a bike without a helmet. Human skulls were not built for falls form 7 feet up at speeds in excess of 15 mph.

Ben wants us to bring him his bike when we see him this weekend. We will. And a helmet. It's a need, not a want.