Mr B has new wheels! Whoop! Whoop! I hear you chorus.
A sleek Jag, you are maybe thinking, just the ticket for a man of considerable
style. Or something racy, perhaps. An MG? Or a power car, like a BMW whatever series we’re up to these days - I wouldn't know, myself, because my Grand Old Lady is now 14 years old and pieces of trim keep falling off her.
I am so very sorry to disappoint you, dear readers, but Mr B’s new carriage is a Super Duper wheelchair which arrived in a downpour of rain this morning, delivered by a lovely, smiley man who
took enormous trouble to explain the workings of this exciting new toy.
The Super Duper wheelchair - don't worry, I'm sure I'll be naming it soon enough - is self-propelled.
This means that, once Mr B gets the hang of it, I won't have to push him around anymore. This, I tell him encouragingly, will be amazingly liberating for both of us. He will be able to wheel himself over to the patio doors to check on my progress tidying up
the garden for winter, planting daffodil bulbs and winter pansies. He will be able to pour dire misgivings on my plan to grow Charlotte potatoes in our veggie trough, in time for Christmas. I’ve never grown my own potatoes for Christmas dinner - this
will be a “first”, I trill. Mr B looks doubtful. Moreover he will be able to scoff at my new Children’s Garden, planted in a faded toy truck which used to be our son’s pride and joy when he was a toddler. Maybe, now I come to think
about it, Mr B should wheel himself somewhere else?
How about the kitchen? He could help wash up or peel the potatoes for dinner, I suggest, winningly. Mr B is
unconvinced that this will be either amazing or liberating. However he does manage to negotiate his way into the kitchen, through several doors, with consummate skill. When I congratulate him on his expertise he reminds me, witheringly, that he is not a woman
driver. Mr B is not exactly what you would call politically correct…
It is probably true to say that I am rather more excited by Mr B’s new wheels
than he is. Except that it is gradually dawning on me that I now need to reorganise the furniture in our living room to make his progress around the house easier. You may be thinking that's no big deal but you haven't seen the “stuff” carefully
hidden, out of sight and out of mind, behind the sofa and the armchairs. Books I am going to read now that I have my brand new reading glasses but which have been piling up, enticingly, in one corner. Along with several yellow files, waiting for me to organise
my paperwork, a collection of DVDs begging to be watched, my knitting bag with Projects in The Making spilling out if it, on account of the fact that the zip has got caught up in a ball of pink cotton and now can't be closed.
It's all too much, don't you know? Especially as I am still in the middle of clearing out all the kitchen drawers so that the next time I am visited by the Three Rampaging Rascals they will find nothing
in the least bit dangerous therein. They will be SO disappointed…
Not so Mr B. It may take time but I reckon he will be Well Up For It, once he realises
that he is going to be able to check up on what I'm up to, in the garden, the kitchen or wherever.
Have wheels, will travel…