Pushed around for the first time

Have you ever been in a wheel­chair? I have. For the first time. Just now. It was so ex­hil­a­rat­ing! Pushed stur­dily by my grand­son, we bumped and shud­dered over the rough road of the drive, then, puff­ing up the steep rise (my grand­son, not me!) on to the smooth sur­face of the tar­mac. The wind whis­tled in my hair, dark storm clouds loomed above. We scooted by yel­low daisies and pur­ple flow­ers peep­ing at us from the grass. On, on we went. I saluted the horses – Xispa, Suzy and Ruby and the pony Català – they con­tin­ued hoover­ing grass and seemed to­tally un­moved by our pass­ing. The sheep moved slightly in­wards in their fields, more be­cause of sight­ing Tilly the dog than be­cause of the wheel­chair and its oc­cu­pant. On, on we went past a neigh­bour-farmer mend­ing his fence – he did look sur­prised! Jordi had only ever seen me walk­ing the dog, but he was too far away to en­quire. Tilly was find­ing the pace dif­fi­cult. Ac­cus­tomed to walk­ing close by my side she failed to sense the cor­rect space be­tween her and the wheel­chair. Past an­other farm­house with tall, tall to­bacco plants rais­ing their pink / red heads. Adam shouted in my ear that to­bacco plants are sup­posed to ward off pests from the veg­etable gar­dens. Thun­der began, and then large drops of rain plop­ping on our heads. The word 'flash-floods' darted into my head and, si­mul­ta­ne­ously, we thought of turn­ing round and whizzing home.

At home, in the dry, wheel­chair stowed in the garage, quiet with vis­i­tors gone, I thought of what it must be like to have to be in a wheel­chair all the time. Mine was a fun ad­ven­ture be­cause of a trou­ble­some foot.... Lately I had re­sisted the fam­ily's pleas to take a wheel­chair at air­ports, avoid­ing the end­less tun­nels to­wards gates and on to exits. “Pride” the fam­ily as­sured me. And so it was. Today I had had a glimpse of what it could be like, to be for­ever in a wheel­chair. Prac­ti­cal it is. But not fun.