I still remember the way the air felt that afternoon. It was Mother’s Day, and after years of me talking about my bikes, my mom: Leslie: finally agreed to hop on the back of my Harley for a ride. She had never been on one before. She was nervous, but once we hit the open road, I could feel her relax. When we pulled back into the driveway, she had this look of pure, unadulterated joy on her face. "Troy," she said, "I want to go again. Let's do this more often." We never got th

Do you ever look at the world and feel a bit small? I know I do. It’s easy to scroll through the news or walk down a city street and feel like the problems, domestic violence, sex trafficking, the cycles of trauma, are just too big for one person to fix. You want to help, but where do you even start? If you’ve been following our journey at Leslie’s Ride, you know that we believe in the power of the "small" things. A single ride. A shared song. And yes, even a humble raffle ti

I still remember the way the air felt that afternoon. It was Mother’s Day, and after years of me talking about my bikes, my mom: Leslie: finally agreed to hop on the back of my Harley for a ride. She had never been on one before. She was nervous, but once we hit the open road, I could feel her relax. When we pulled back into the driveway, she had this look of pure, unadulterated joy on her face. "Troy," she said, "I want to go again. Let's do this more often." We never got th

I still remember the wind. It was a crisp afternoon, and for the first time, my mom, Leslie, climbed onto the back of my bike. She wasn't a rider, not really, but she wanted to share that part of my world just once. I can still see her smile in the rearview mirror, her hair catching the breeze as we cruised through the neighborhood. When we pulled back into the driveway, she was beaming. "Troy," she told me, "I want to do that again. Next time, let's go further." But there wa