Ball sports: A personal account of a testicle-tearing sporting endeavour

It hurt. I remember that much and didn't need the blinding white flash of pain that exploded in my brain to tell me that my coconuts were in serious danger!

Slowly the intense white light faded into blackness; Despair, woe and concern over the future procreation-ability, or lack thereof due to gonad-damage. The darkness was blessed...

Actually it wasn't blessed at all I learned...My beans still hurt, a lot. My older brother was doubled over in laughter as I rolled around on the ground clutching my abused rocks in my hands whilst also trying to regain my breath, block the pain out...And worry about the crash my bike had just sustained.

The day had started like any other; My brother and I out riding our bikes and getting up to pre-teenager-type shenanigans around the property we lived on. The year was 1981 and me and my testicles had been together for eleven good years. We were quite fond of each other.

As usual we ended up having races and had turned the day into a series of "sporting challenges" where each of us would devise some feat of bike-riding, a jump, biggest skid or race-track course to compete against the other. We'd keep score with chalk on the concrete floor of the verandah and over the day the challenges became more and more...Creative.

The final challenge before the incident was an odd one and looking back I can't seem to recall the logic of it. Although, I was eleven so logic wasn't my strong suit at that stage.

Back to the story...

The rope was tied securely on the head-stem of my brother's bike, a green 3-speed chopper-style thing with a long seat and a low sissy-bar at the back of the seat. Not unlike the one in the image. src

I had one too. Mine was yellow...Yeah, I know...But we had got them brand new and for my family having something brand new meant we valued it as money wasn't something mum and dad had a lot of. Those bikes were our freedom and we loved them, looked after them and spent a lot of time on them.

The rope of some 20-30 feet or so long was also securely tied to the seat-stem of my bike which connected both together. I'm not sure what the challenge was, maybe some weird bike-tug-of-war? We rode around in this fashion for a while and all seemed well, if a little odd but then I, as lead bike, rode up a large mound that existed on the property. We had several and they were good for jumping bikes from and using for berms.

This is where things start to take a goolie-crushing turn...Back to the story...

I hit the mound and disappeared over the other side completely. I came to a stop to wait for my brother to come over placing one foot on the ground to balance. As we were tied together my brother had no choice but to follow.

Now I can't be sure, but I think he had decided, for some unknown reason, to come over the crest in a similar fashion to how we always did [very fast]. Did he forget our bikes were tied together by a sturdy rope? I just waited on the other side of the hill, bike facing away from it, stationary, me sitting on the long seat of my bike with a foot resting on the ground, twisted around looking back at the mound.

Back to the story...

He flew over the top and I watched in awe at his speed...It looked like he would take off, he was going that fast!

My brother crested the hill and headed down the other side then sped by me accelerating away. I watched the rope snake away behind him as he went and then it happened. The rope went taught...The rope tied to my bike.

My chopper was torn away from between my legs. It didn't go cleanly though. Oh no, it grabbed my family jewels on the way through, a firm grip, and made an attempt to take them along with it. Not my Marbles bike! Nooooooooo!

Now, for the blokes out there, if you've ever had a heavy knock to the cobblers you'll know what I felt...For the ladies? Go kick a dude in the pills and watch his reaction...That'll give you an idea of the pain. It reaches right inside a bloke, takes his breath away, and generally elicits a gutteral "oof" or actual cry of pain and anguish. It hurts. A lot.

Back to the story...

Not happy to deal me a glancing blow to the nads the seat dragged along them, as the bike made it's mad dash for freedom, making the glancing blow become more like a lengthy grinding not unlike the tectonic plates grinding against one another below the surface of the planet. And then that low sissy-bar at the rear of the seat...Oh they ways I could describe what that felt like as it issued a death-blow to my nuts on the way through to bike-freedom.

Looking back now I can see my forlorn self rolling in pain clutching my cojones, my bike finally coming to rest in a clatter wheels, handlebars and peddles and my brother thinking the entire scene was the funniest thing he had ever seen. Seems funny now, my plums have forgotten the pain, but one never really forgets such ball abuse to be honest. It never really goes away.

Back to the story...

As the pain subsided to a level that permitted me the ability to speak I let rip with "ya fucking idiot!" at my brother. I could do better now of course, but I was only eleven and not at ninja-level swear-status at that stage...That came later.

My brother came over and, realising I wasn't joking [I did that sort of thing a lot as a young kid - Still do now] and tried to offer me some comfort by saying, "why did you stop ya dick head?" He's all heart and knows just what to say.

I remember being in pain for a long while, and also making a bit of an exploratory investigation into my pants, to determine if indeed I still had walnuts, two of them, and was pleased to see I did. More importantly my bike was fine, a little dusty and with another scratch to add to the patina, but otherwise ok. Thank goodness my bike was ok.

Somehow I survived my youth. I did some dumb things, as you can tell, and at times came close to serious and lasting damage. That was all part of growing up back then, along with making our own fun, even berry-tearing fun like this. As an almost 50-year-old I'm pleased to say my stones and I are still enjoying an excellent relationship...They remember though, and aren't keen to repeat the bicycle incident of 1981.

Despite the pain I've been left unscathed by that lamentable day although I don't have kids so...Hmm, maybe that's the reason? I can't recall what I did to pay my brother back for it although you can be sure it was something equally stupid and probably painful. That's just what we did.

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