I was on my way back from volunteering at the Pennsylvania State Time Trial Championships in Dauphin, PA yesterday. On a desolate stretch of the PA Turnpike I saw a motorcycle on the side of the road.
No rider.
I drove on and figured he went into the woods to do nature’s business.
Not quite. Four miles down the road I saw a guy walking, motorcycle helmet on.
I pulled over. Asked what’s up. If he needed help.
“Ran out of gas back there. Sure, I’d love a ride.”
The rider was a young man. Ben (I found out his name later) was riding from Kentucky. He told me he ran out of gas in one of the longest stretches of Turnpike without a gas station.
“I was looking that up on my phone while I was walking,” he said. (He’d walked about 4 miles by that time.)
The guy was so nice. He didn’t want to put me out. Said I could let him out of the car near an overpass so that I didn’t have to exit. Then when I was on the exit ramp, said, “Go ahead and turn back. I can get out here. I don’t want you to have to pay an extra toll.”
I drove him to a Turkey Hill gas station. And smiled when he was surprised that I said I’d drive him back to his disabled bike.
It was a long way back.
About an hour of driving in total to head back west some 18 miles past his bike, then come back east to it. We talked about his job as a mechanical engineer. How he’s traveling to Russia for work. How he works with his hands and does technical work at the same time.
We pulled up behind his bike. I got out of the car while Ben poured gas in the tank.
“I’m gonna stay here and make sure your bike starts,” I said.
Ben pulled some money out of his pocket. “I’d like to pay you for your troubles.”
I waved him off. “It’s karma, man. Pay it forward.”
You know when you meet some people, you just know they will?
Ben will.
