A Few Days Without A Car Is Just What The Doctor Ordered.

Our chariot is taking a few days off at the car Spa...

Living in the country everyone, or just about everyone, has a car attached to their hip. Heck, some older and lazier folk even drive a hundred meters to the shop to get milk and bread. Oh yes, really.

Hopping into your car to visit, go to work or just go for a drive seems normal and even natural. But here is the nice thing when you are car-less for a while. No pressure to go anywhere. No silly ideas of perhaps buying something else at the supermarket. Something that you can easily survive without. There is always the local shop to be walked to and unless you have a mule
( eh no, I don't mean Bob even though he can be as stubborn as at times...birds of a feather etc! ) along for your shop, you are limited by how much stuff weighs.

Even without a car, life and work do go on. Yesterday I was walking home from an English lesson and had about a 2 kilometer walk in front of me. Not a train smash and as you and the whole village knows, I do walk for fun each and almost every morning. Anyway, I heard a car idling up behind me. Yes, courtesy rules of the road are adhered to. Driving past a walker or cyclist, one slows down to crawling speed.

I moved onto the grass verge and heard the car slow down to more than an idle. It stopped next to me and a villager asked me whether I would like a lift or ( seriously) if I wanted to exercise and walk home? Obviously he knew of my love of walking but as it was close to lunchtime with the sun reminding us of it still being summer despite a very cold and fresh start to the day, I accepted his offer.

He lives two lanes away from us but still took the time to drop me off at our gate. Bob, who was getting the post at that exact time, at first wondered who was stopping outside the gate, then who was driving his Miss Biggi to our gate and only when he realized that it was a local pensioner in the driver's seat, did the green tinge in his eyes disappear.

Someone phoned me and asked if I could visit her in the afternoon. We arranged it for three o'clock which would give me enough time to get there. It is a brisk 30 minute walk...She phoned at half past one to ask me to come over a bit sooner. Not wanting to make her feel bad, I merely said:

" Not a problem, I'll see you in a good half an hour."

Little did she know that I wasn't being vague but meant it literally.

My mum knew where I was walking to and offered to drive me back home in style afterwards. I gratefully accepted and was even rewarded with a few bottles of her fabulous Blaufränkisch wine. It just goes to show that rushing around and through life, we forget to smell the roses or God forbid forget to drink great wine.

Biggi

My walk to work....