Combating Monkey Butt

The first time I became aware of the malady called monkey butt was when it was mentioned in a Duluth Trading Company catalogue that offered a product that went by the name "Anti Monkey Butt Powder."

Monkey butt was described in the catalogue copy as "a term coined by bikers  to refer to soreness, itching and redness from long hours on a bike seat." (Presumably horseback riders, bicyclists, truck drivers, and writers (?) are similarly afflicted.)

The mention of this strangely named condition caused me to think back to the early 1960s when my second oldest brother Richard and his traveling companion nicknamed Lucky (who was also our sister's boyfriend at the time), crossed the country on a motorcycle from New York to Los Angeles, where my mother and I were living.

When Richard and Lucky got to Needles, California, the bike broke down a la the scene in the movie Motorcycle Diaries in which the motorcycles of Che Guevara and his traveling companion break down as they travel the length of South America. Richard asked our mother to wire them some money so they could continue on to L.A. She did and they safely completed the journey.

I now regret not interviewing my brother, who died in 1989, about that three-thousand-mile trek. I wonder what sights and adventures they encountered along the way. I also wonder how they combated the dreaded symptoms of monkey butt.