Live free or die?

My money is on the latter.

This past weekend took me through the great state of New Hampshire, which likes to flaunt its individualism with catchy slogans, the lack of a sales tax and the government-sponsored freedom to experience traumatic brain injury and/or death.

When driving in the state on a clear spring or summer day, I am always quickly reminded that New Hampshire is the only state in the East where motorcycle riders are not required to wear a helmet of any kind, no matter how old they are. This particular day I passed — and was passed by — a whole variety of wild teenagers, tattooed biker gangs and balding senior citizens, all electing to ride sans headgear.

What anti-helmet proponents call their inalienable right — put down in the small print of both the Constitution and the Ten Commandments — is what I call madness. Can we really let the certifiably mad drive around and do whatever they want?

Granted, I don't fully understand the call to two wheels to begin with. I've reached the crisis age when I'm supposed to hear the roar of the motorcycle in my dreams then go out one day and spend the mortgage money on a used Yamaha — despite the protests of my wife ("But it'll save a fortune on gas, honey," I'd return.) — and give the children death-defying trips to and from Little League that will haunt their nightmares for decades to come. I haven't heard that call personally, but I have seen it in my own family and with my own friends.

While I won't ride a motorcycle myself unless it's made by Volvo — and has four wheels, an airbag and a protective cage — I don't begrudge those who do. As long as they have a large enough shred of gray matter to realize that protecting their skulls while doing it is a good idea.

I can appreciate that the wind through one's hair is an exhilarating experience, as is the occasional dragonfly in one's teeth and/or nostrils. These things can be simulated in other ways, however, and don't explain what all the chrome-domed bikers are doing on the road. Wind through their nose hairs? What's the rest of the appeal of helmet-less motorcycle riding?

Already, riding a motorcycle is inherently more dangerous than driving a car. Every simple fender bender could be a fatality on a hog. And riding in New Hampshire itself has its own particular added dangers.

It's close to Massachusetts, which has the nation's worst and most malevolent drivers. New Hampshire features winding mountain roads, and the biker never knows when he's going to hit a pothole the size of John Sununu or bump into a moose or radiation-enhanced squirrel of some sort, catapulting him into Lost River Gorge. I've taken the tour — there are at least 30 Harleys floating around down there.

There's one reason that the Hell's Angels never took over the country, which many people once thought was their destiny: The call of the open road that draws them to New Hampshire and thins their ranks every year.

Certainly, the lack of a helmet law isn't New Hampshire's only controversial stab at individuality. It's the only state that allows skydivers to jump without a parachute, provided "they promise to aim for a large haystack." It's the only state that requires smoking in public places and forces resident drivers to cut the seat belts out of their cars with "a razor blade or shard of broken glass." Residents also have the freedom to put the same broken glass and razor blades in Halloween candy, if, you know, it makes them feel free.

I know that I can't do anything about changing the way New Hampshire — which has a bicycle helmet law — thinks. The most I can do is steer clear of the bikers when I'm there. I know there are free-spirited New Yorkers, however, who are planning to ride out to Franconia Notch and toss their helmets at the crumbled remains of the Old Man of the Mountain as they pass.

Don't do it. You can live free without dying.

E-mail Steve Ouellette at: ouellette1918@gmail.com