Ryan BrenneckeNancy Todd is the night city editor at The Bulletin and is an avid cyclist.

I think about father and son every time I ride now.

I encountered them when my husband and I were bicycling the new paved trail from Sunriver to Lava Lands for the first time Labor Day weekend. I was a ways ahead of him when a young boy and a man approached me on bicycles.

The boy began making tight swerves with his front wheel, back and forth, back and forth as any kid might do. But then he seemed to lose control, braked and went down in a flash. His father was right behind, crashing into him and falling over on top of him.

In an instant I heard two agonizing sounds: a fellow human howling in pain, and the boy putting up a wail, “Daddy, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to do it, Daddy …”

I slammed on my brakes and unclipped from my bike in record time. I lifted the dad’s bicycle off the boy, whose helmet was wedged in the bike frame. Then I instinctively grabbed a bag with some Band-Aids that I carry in my bike pack.

But the boy’s father, who was already sitting up, asked me to dial 911. He had his own phone out and was calling family members who were at the Lava Lands Visitor Center less than a half-mile away.

He was turned away from me and what I didn’t immediately see was the raw knot on his left forehead with blood dripping down, as only a head wound can bleed. He had hit the pavement with his head.

While my call to 911 turned into a long conversation, a woman who next bicycled up jumped off her bike and immediately turned to calming the injured man’s 6-year-old son. She assured him repeatedly that what had happened was an accident, and she shielded him from seeing his bleeding father up close.

Next to join the triage was my husband. He knelt down with the father to comfort him and used his own cycling kerchief to sop up the blood dripping down the man’s face onto his hands. His forehead looked like hamburger, and my husband was hesitant to press on it, as 911 advised.

The dispatcher asked me several times whether the bicyclist was wearing a helmet. With the father and son close by, I didn’t want to reply, “NO, he wasn’t wearing a helmet,” as if to say he’s stupid. But I repeatedly told dispatch there was only one helmet that I could see, which the boy had been wearing.

Turns out, the man, 36, was an experienced cyclist with a fancy carbon fiber ride he had built. He was on an outing with family members and they had grabbed only one helmet — his — so he had the boy wear it. It’s what any parent would do.

About the time dispatch finished quizzing me repeatedly about details and location, a Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office SUV pulled up along the Lava Lands access road across a small forested strip from the bike path. A deputy hustled over to us to assess the situation, then went back to his vehicle for first-aid equipment.

The bicyclists’ family had also come down the path with a stroller. Then came the paramedics from Sunriver. They treated the man’s wound and road rash on his hands; his son, unscathed physically, was back to smiling and was really taken by the suited-up paramedics.

My husband and I pedaled on after the half-hour encounter, and we last saw the man back at the Lava Lands parking lot. He had shown no signs of concussion. But we will never know what happened to him after his bloody Sunday. Most likely he would have needed stitches, and surely he will have scars — he smacked his head full bore on asphalt, resulting in a remarkable injury given the slow speed.

Every time I take to a bike trail I see dozens of riders, out at their leisure, not wearing helmets. (I generally don’t see this out on highways with more serious bicyclists.) I see them on the streets of Bend, even Third Street.

Yet a stray shoelace or a pant cuff is all it takes to fall off a bike. I know.

A helmet is all it takes to protect your head.

Father and son probably will remember this lesson forever.

I know I will. •