Seven Questions Before Selling the Motorbike That Rode With Me for Twelve Years

"Three million seven. It still runs fine, but it's an older model, and people don't go for those much."

The man at the used-bike shop tapped the little fuel tank as he spoke, the tap of someone who has tapped thousands of them. A ceiling fan turned slowly, and the smell of engine oil had soaked into even the counter where he did his sums. I stood there with my hands in my pockets, and the price sounded like it was about some object that had nothing to do with me.

"Let me think about it," I said.

Twelve years. A manual bike, once blue and now faded, the right mirror tilted ever since it went down in the rain one day, the seat patched in two places. It carried me to my first day at work, carried me to my wife's family home for the first time, carried both our children to the market before we bought a second bike. Now the house has a newer one, and this one has stood in the corner of the porch for three months under a thin coat of dust.

This piece does not tell you whether to sell or keep. It has only seven questions, to be written by hand, before the day you give up the key. I wrote them for myself, and then thought that somebody else might be standing in front of a bike, a sewing machine, a guitar, in just the same way.

It is not saying that objects are only objects, so let them go. It is not saying you must keep everything to prove you have feelings, either. Many people feel lighter after selling a bike, many feel hollow, and some feel both in the same week. The questions here are not for deciding. They are for hearing what exactly you are seeing off.

Why selling a motorbike feels like closing a stretch of life

Saturday afternoon, out of the shop, I stood by the road waiting for my wife to ride over and pick me up. The sun was low and road dust rose in a yellow haze. I texted her on Zalo: "He's offering three million seven." She texted back one word: "So?" I did not know what to answer.

The first thing I thought was that I was sorry about the money, sorry about the thing. That is what anyone would assume, and for a while I believed it too. But three million seven did not make it hard to breathe. What kept me standing by the roadside was something else: this bike was not only a bike. It was twelve years gathered into one object I could touch. The falls, the late mornings, the smell of oil on my sleeve, the sound of the exhaust before it turned into our alley, all of it had been pasted onto it like entries in a notebook. Selling it meant handing that notebook to a stranger, and the notebook did not feel finished.

Dig a little further and there is another layer, not so comfortable. The bike let me see twelve years go by, and ordinary life seldom lets me see that. The day I moved out of my rented room, twelve years sounded very far away. Now it sat right there, faded, the seat patched in two places. When the bike left, the one piece of evidence I could see for myself about that stretch of time would leave with it. What I was sorry about was not exactly the bike, but the proof.

So there is one small thing worth doing before the day: sit with it for ten minutes, not to repair anything, not to polish it before the sale.

The way to tell you did it right: by the end you remember a detail you had long forgotten, like the squeak the kickstand makes when you flick it down. The first time, many people feel a bit embarrassed, sitting there talking to a bike feels odd, especially when a neighbour walks past. After about a week, some find they recall small details more clearly and the day of the handover is lighter in the hand; some notice nothing different and sell the bike just as they would have anyway. On a day when you are too busy, one minute beside the bike is enough: write one detail and go.

I stumbled on day one over the wiping. I wanted to clean it before sitting down. Cleaning sounds like a kind way to treat it, but really it was a way of giving my hands a job so I would not have to sit still in front of a dusty bike. I wiped, then wiped again, and suddenly caught myself polishing it for the buyer. Do something else instead: leave the dust. The dust is part of the three months it spent in the corner of the porch.

Seven questions, from light to deep

I wrote these seven over four evenings, two a night, with only one on the last. You do not have to write them all at once. You do not have to write well. Write for yourself to read.

1. What does the bike smell like?

A nudge: recall the engine oil, the smell of a hot plastic raincoat, the smell of sun soaked into the seat. One smell is enough, written with your nose rather than explained.

2. When did it last annoy you?

A nudge: slow to start, out of fuel halfway home, a strange rattle. Write it as annoyed as you really were, without softening. You might catch yourself laughing as you write.

3. Where has it taken you that you would not have gone without it?

A nudge: an old workplace, a road along the river, the house of a friend you no longer speak to. Small places count too.

4. Who has sat behind you on this bike?

A nudge: no names needed, only the way they sat, whether they held your waist or the seat. If there is someone who no longer rides behind you, write about them or stop here, either is fine. Stopping is also an answer.

5. Is there a mark on it you never repaired, and why did you leave it?

A nudge: a scratch on the left panel, the crooked mirror, a sticker half peeled off. There is often a small reason you never told anyone.

6. What did you of twelve years ago think this bike would take you to?

A nudge: it might be a job, a house, a person. No need to compare with today. Write only what he thought, nothing more.

7. If you handed over the key today, what do you want to keep that does not have to go with the bike?

A nudge: a slow way of riding a familiar road, the habit of filling up on Monday mornings, the way you call it by name. Whatever you can write down already has a place to live inside you.

I think question seven is the hardest, and the only one I rewrote, three times. The first time I wrote: "I want to keep everything." The second: "I want to keep that feeling." Looking at both lines, I asked myself:

"Which feeling?"

"Crossing the bridge on a Monday morning, before the sun is fully up."

"Does that need the bike?"

"Maybe... not. It needs a bridge and a morning."

By the third time I wrote something quite different, much shorter.

People tend to stumble here by turning this into a test to reach a conclusion. After seven answers you look back and ask: so should I sell or not? The question is tempting because it seems useful, but the seven were not written to answer it. They are only for hearing more clearly. The decision can wait for another sitting, once the pen is down. If you are still torn after writing, stay torn. The bike is not going anywhere.

The day of the handover, and the hand that still reaches for a pocket

Monday morning the buyer came for the bike. A young man in a battered helmet, with an easy smile.

"You've looked after it well. I commute a long way, so I'll get a lot more years out of it."

"Good. Just remember to change the oil on time."

I said it fast, like reading words off a slip of paper. I took the money, handed over the key, watched him kick the starter, and listened to the familiar engine fade down the end of the road. Done. What I had thought would be hard took three minutes.

The strange part came afterwards. That afternoon, walking to the market, my hand kept reaching into my right trouser pocket for the key ring with the little fish charm. Three times in one day. That night lying in bed I still thought that tomorrow morning I would go out and check whether the bike was in the corner of the porch.

People tend to think the emptiness after seeing off an object is all about feeling. Partly it is. But much of it is the body's habit: hands, eyes, feet ran to one rhythm for twelve years, and that rhythm does not know the bike has gone. It needs time to slow down, differently for each person. Nothing was wrong with me. My body was simply looking for something that was no longer there.

One small thing helped. In the first days after the handover, each time my hand reached for a pocket or my eyes slid toward the porch corner, instead of brushing it off I paused for a beat and said quietly: "Right, it isn't there anymore." It sounds silly, but some people find the lurch gets shorter, and some feel no difference at all. After a week my hand reached less, and I now use the porch corner for a pot of herbs.

It is easy to trip here too, by covering the emptiness with something bought straight away: parts for the new bike, an accessory. Filling it fast is tempting because it feels lighter at once, but it only moves the empty space somewhere else. Leave it a few days. If you want to do something, do something small: wash your hands, drink a glass of water, look at the empty corner for a while.

If you are reading this because what you face is harder to part with than a motorbike, there is impermanence takes nothing away, it only shows how tightly we hold, and delete old photos or keep them, and why both are right, which is about another kind of holding on: the kind in your phone.

If you sit down to write and nothing comes

That happens often too, and it does not mean you lack feeling.

First reason: the questions do not fit your object. These seven were written for a motorbike. If you are seeing off a sewing machine, a guitar, a kitchen, swap the word "bike" for its name and change question one to whatever sense suits it: the clatter of the treadle, the smell of old fabric, the way worn wood feels smooth in the hand. The questions need room for your object to breathe.

Second reason: you are writing to make it good. The notebook, the pen, the seat beside the bike make you feel you must produce something worthwhile. Allow yourself one ugly sentence, one clipped one, one with only three words. Writing "engine oil" and stopping still counts as writing.

And if the bike was once someone else's, someone who has died, and every time you think of handing over the key your throat tightens, then not selling yet is fine, and not writing yet is fine. There is no deadline. Sadness or emptiness that lasts for weeks, even after everything is done, is something to talk through with a person who has training for it, instead of keeping it to yourself.

The corner of our porch now has three pots of herbs and a plastic stool where I sometimes sit and look out at the alley. There is nothing there to remember anymore, and yet I still sit.

May you have an afternoon sitting beside something you are about to see off, and recall one smell.

This article was created with AI assistance.