I recently took the Motorcycle Safety Program, not only because I've wanted to learn to drive since that season of riding a couple years back, but to support owning the Shoei helmet that heretofore has functioned only to collect dust in the closet.

Course completion can be applied toward endorsement and motorcycle acquisition. You get 90 days to take the completion card to the DMV, take your written test and pay for that extra letter on your license. After 90 days you have to take the class again or hazard to ride the course at the DMV. I wouldn't want to risk that. I never want to take the driving test again it was so challenging the one time.

You head out to the course with a group of motorcyclists and wannabes, overconfident in new classic leather jackets. The majority are women and more of them than you'd expect are beholden to the misplaced whimsy of mid-life crises. Like adolescents, they seem not to know who they are so will try to mimic the pack leader, the instructor. In our class that would be one charismatic Boeing union man complex with -isms and -phobias, and grounded in the rugged adornment of motorcycling kind.

Watch the women smoke and coo through the noise of unworn leather, talking tough and abandoning women's wherewithal for the unreachable talents of the more experienced male riders.

Not all passed. After eight hours in the classroom, eleven on the course, the test demanded fresh alertness and comprehensive adaptation of the riding exercises. One shot for each task: If you weren't hitting the mark regularly on the practice runs, you probably didn't make it on the solo try.

I passed with few errors, to my surprise and great relief.

Now I'm looking to buy a motorcycle, to perhaps timeshare with my apartment manager or anyone else....

But this week in Portland I bought a road bike, a Cannondale R1000, to replace and supersede the reliable old friend that was stolen this summer.

It's a chunk not out of pocket but squarely into debt for a lot of bike at a fantastic, yet still chokingly high, sale price. I'm prone to remorse after purchases of this caliber. Just like after I bought the car, I didn't really want to look at or think about it. But on the drive back up I'd occasionally remember it was there in the back of the Volvo. I'd turn around to admire its elegance, its virgin surfaces, and imagine how smooth and light it will feel under my power.

Now it leans against the bookshelf waiting to be let out. I still have to buy shoes for the clipless pedals so, for a little while, I can only approach it, sometimes climbing on top and rocking back and forth reading book titles along the row at eye level.

A new car, a new bike, a motorcycle — to have one of each is too much for one person! It's not just that can't afford it, I'm offended by the decadence. But I want it all anyway. Gradually, the pieces come together: shoes any day and plans for canvas pants, for example. Then the quandary will be choosing among them.