Got a quarter buddy?

It's weird how a tradition or superstition can be continued.

I've worn a silver chain with an american quarter around my neck since I was twenty-one.   Before I flew out to Vegas to take part in the Scope Grand Canyon Bike Away 2000 my Dad gave me the chain and clasp for my 21st Birthday.  The idea was that I would keep a coin from that year, which was bound to be a significant one.  Surely enough in Vegas I found a coin minted in 2000 and kept hold of it for the duration of that trip.  Taking in riding through Utah, Bryce Canyon, Arizona, down to the Grand Canyon, helicopter trips, train rides, road trips across Joshua Valley, Death Valley, Sequia and Kings Canyon National Park, San Fran, LA and everything in between.  Upon my return to the UK the coin was sealed in the clasp on the chain at a jewellers on Wote Street in Basingstoke during lunch from one of my temping jobs in town at the time.

Since then I've had phases of not wearing it - most significantly for my whole time in Melbourne as I had to find a new chain to replace my original that had been trapped in a washing machine, the background story to that is a bit of a detour, which I may take in more detail later - But since the chain was replaced It's almost always been around my neck, and the coin itself was never far away, at times even hanging around cotton or other makeshift adornments.

The coin I wear now though is the one my father wore for all the time I can remember.  I have memories of playing with this chain when I was very young.  Years later, when he would take us to Alton Sports Centre pool on a Sunday to swim we used to practice swimming underwater by collecting it from the bottom of the pool.  In all the many pictures of him strutting his stuff on holiday the chain is there.

The coin is from 1964, and though some of the details of how it came about may be slightly convoluted now, the way I am left to tell the story is that he collected it on a trip to the states in his days as a sailor (well there were a few years in the merchant navy in the 60's).  It was a coin from the year of his first visit to America.  Upon return to London the wages from that cruise were very rapidly squandered on gambling, booze and living the high life I suppose.  With nothing else in his pockets young Don walked into a snooker hall to raise some money.  He used his lucky quarter to hustle some money out of a few rounds of snooker betting with money he didn't have, the intervening bit is unclear, but somehow he blagged his way to fuller pockets.  From there a few turns of good fortune and the 1964 quarter dollar took it's place round his neck.

His superstitions always confused me a little.  Like the fact he refused to wear green.  Once there was an evening where money was lost on a green table in the same evening a green car was crashed into a green lamp post on a green verge whilst wearing a green suit.  His aversion to green stitching was quite amusing at times.  Now I've carried one superstition on and it is something I'm in mind of a lot during this ride.  On hot ascents the chain flips around, on steep descents when tucked in it dangles by the headset.

Using quarters as currency rather than jewellery is strange.  Dad and I were always aware of the irony of wearing a quarter round your neck, legal tender of a foreign country, daily loosing value due to inflation.  And so much less valuable than the chain or memories that keep it safe.  My connection to it's 'lucky charm' is even more tenuous.  Now more than ever this trinket serves as a reminder of the shared stories and times that the coin has seen.  And it's probably because of this coin that I've always had a small fascination with the journeys of coins and currency.  Inanimate objects that pass through so many hands and see into so many lives.

The chain and coin I wear now is the same one that my Dad brought from America on the ship.  The same one he wore through is rise from driver to Marketing Director in the motor industry.  The one he wore to meetings pitching Musical Socks to M&S, or shoes with lights to Clark's.  On the trips to Hong Kong to help launch the Singing Swinging Golfer. The one he wore to the swanky parties in town.  The one he wore when he met his wife/my mother.  The one he wore when myself my brother and sister were born, and raised, all through our childhood and adolescence and early adulthood.  He wore it in the tough times of divorces and lean times for the business, through all the times he worried about things that didn't happen.  All the places he travelled in the last 40 years of his life, all the people he met, all the stories he told, all the deals he made, and deals he dreamed about and deals he lost.  The laughs and tears.

I took it from his neck on the 4th February 2011 he had been admitted to hospital late the previous evening.  By the change of shift at 8pm that Friday night the decision had been made to put him on a ventilator and all jewellery or adornments had to be removed in the ICU.  "Over head" was one of the last things he was able to vocalise before the nerve damage got bad enough to take away the ability to talk and the ventilator was manoeuvred down his throat.  There were months in hospital seeing my father so weak and reliant on machines and 24 hour care to keep his body ticking over, tubes and wires everywhere, the shave, the muscle wastage, the growing white beard and wild hair.  The grim nhs robes.  Obviously none of that looked normal, but one of the strangest things of the appearance of 'The Don' was that he wasn't wearing his chain.  It just didn't look like him.

He certainly was still him.  Even with absolute minimal movement through his illness, he was still giving any attractive lady 'the eyes'.  As we figured out the spelling board after a month or so and nods and winks could spell out phrases he was implying trysts with the female attendants.  Even trying to set me up with the Doctor, on his deathbed, while my girlfriend was in the waiting room.  His ability to embarrass me in any occasion was still strong even without the chain, let alone the power of speech or any muscle activity beyond his eyes and forehead.

I don't need this chain to remind me of him, or his adventures, or the adventures we had together.  I don't need it for luck.  I don't need it for the coin operated laundry in the succession of motels we're going through.  I've thought of leaving it somewhere along this trip.  A small memorial to DSH somewhere in the USA.  But I imagine I'll keep a hold of it really.  Because it is a part of me now, and as silly as a silver chain with a quarter dollar on can look, it's been my look for a long time now.

The connection of the coin and this trip is stronger too, beyond it being local currency and its exposure on hot days.  But the chain of events that bought me to participate in this ride would be very different if the chain hadn't been passed onto me so prematurely.  The last time Don came down to visit me in Bristol a week or two before he got taken ill he was on flying form.  Regaling me with stories of his recent exploits around the country.  Expanding on old tales and anecdotes.  Re-telling and expanding on stories of yore and being as open as I'd ever known him to be - and we always had pretty frank and open conversations about anything since as far back as I can recall.  He was plotting for the next ten years, being realistic about the limitations of age and finances but talking of a last great adventure.  Planning to get some of his story down on paper, or film or anywhere.  There really was at least one very good book in the variety of stories he had, and still is... somewhere.  Like Peter said referring to the (musical) service card at his funeral.  "Don Hockman 1940-2011: there's more stories in that dash than most people have in three lifetimes" (maybe not a direct quotation, but along those lines).

So apart from the amazing adventure I'm on for it's own benefits, and the excitement of visiting these amazing places.  To contribute to some work that can add to the mission of improving cycling in cities.  To work, ride and play alongside experienced peers in the industry I aspire to work in.  It's the trip that my dad was planning.  Though he had designs on a nice big winnebago over a bike, and a leisurely pace, probably hopefully with more female company.  There probably would have been more beers, more grouchiness, an equal amount of worrying, a bit more dancing, more out and out arguments, a hell of a lot of laughter and even more tall tales.

His stories are going to gradually fade away.  And his manner of telling them have already gone.  Living life to learn to tell anecdotes may not be the answer to a fulfilling sustainable future, I realise after years of aspiring to such a life.  But I've built up some good ones, and taken a few from my Dad.  I'm adding to them daily here now.  Even if nothing of any more substance than a few good yarns come out of this trip that I'm taking part in because of an extended sequence of events, I still know he's proud of me however it turns out from here.

I'm not likely to leave the chain here, it's a part of me/us.  But I think I have, or I am learning the importance of accepting loss.  Be it a trinket, a broken camera, $20 in the wash, time, opportunities, lovers, loved ones. You can't be too blasé about it all, but knowing the transience of everything and having the right level of perspective is important, I may have tipped a little too far into "ah fuck it" territory in the last two years, and been a bit too dismissive of losses around me.  But I'm certainly appreciative of everything I have got and have had so far, and very excited about what comes my way in future.

I don't need a charm to help my luck.  I don't need a coin on a chain to remind me that I'm lucky.  Just some eyes, ears and a bit of common sense.