Death ride

See it here.

The Dinette Set, as is its wont, takes the road less traveled, eschewing banal conventionality, like humor, in favor of exploring the deeper and more poignant mysteries of the human soul.

Ostensibly a panel about Timmy's new bike and the disastrous consequences which accrue when Dale attempts to take it for a spin, what we actually have is a parable about accepting age with dignity. Dale commits the elemental mistake of attempting to relive his youth by taking the first turn on Timmy's bike and finds himself hurtling towards a strangely empty white space in the panel.

Towards the void, if you will.

The bike at once becomes a figurative and literal death ride, hurtling out of Dale's control towards his own death. In the most optimistic scenario, the panel is entirely metaphoric and speaks to the need to accept the slow descent towards death, rather than hastening one's demise through age-inappropriate thrill-seeking behavior. More disturbingly, the reader must face the possibility the panel is not a metaphor and we are witnessing the moment just before Dale's horrific and fatal bike accident scars Timmy for life.

Whatever the actual answer, a part of me believes this panel is The Dinette Set's homage to Mary Worth's recently departed and irreplaceable stalker-in-Captain-Kangaroo's-clothing, Aldo Kelrast.