Falling

 I have been doing a lot of falling about this week.  With the weather being so good I decided we should take advantage of it and go for a walk through the fields to the Yorkshire Dales ice cream parlour, which is about 2 miles from home.  I have done it before - there and back - in my MSA state, no sweat, so we set off happily down the lane.  It was a bit muddy and wet, but passable.  I was slow but no different than any other day.  Near the end of the lane there is an incline to the barn with a gate to the fields and we met our neighbour there, walking her dog and checking the route for horses.  I was now struggling to get up this tiny incline so much so that our neighbour offered to get her 4x4 drive up the lane and take me back home.  I was with my wife Liz so I was not too concerned, so I turned down her kind offer.  We carried on an open track with a slight incline across the fields; it was beautiful warm and a lovely blue sky.  I began to speed up and couldn’t control my legs, so needed Liz’s arm to maintain my balance, which was becoming precarious.

 We got to the first stile and I lost my balance and fell into a bed of nettles which was a bit of a surprise.  It's not so much falling into them but trying to get out of them is the problem because every time you move there’s a nettle waiting to do its best to  make your life as uncomfortable as possible.  I don’t recommend it but at least you do know you’re alive. Liz swung into action like a team of men changing tyres on a formula 1 car and I was up in no time at all.  Given the way my legs were performing it was not time for heroics; we turned around and headed back the way we came.  Going back was hell; I fell at least five times between the stile and the gate into the lane.  My posture is a problem the bending forward makes me very unstable so that combined with the legs not responding to instructions makes it all very difficult.  I was not capable of walking any distance .This posed a problem of how to get home.  I managed with a great deal of help from Liz, who was beginning to become exhausted, exasperated and concerned, especially because we were being surrounded by an increasingly curious herd of Holstein cows including a young bull. Eventually we  got to the gate and however I have found thewe were just contemplating what to do next when our neighbour’s 4x4 appeared coming towards us up the lane.  When she got out of the vehicle she said that she had an inkling that something was not right, what luck.  It is another example of the goodness in people which I wrote about in one of my earlier blogs.  We have not always seen eye to eye as neighbours so it is even more special that she bothered coming out to check.  So I was bundled into the back of this vehicle a bit like the movies and driven home for a nice cup of tea and a cream doughnut.  I have been told by pyshio and gym trainer that my body is strong including my legs so it not to do with strength but control.

I suppose this now marks a negative watershed, but I don't want to believe it just yet and maybe test it out again but I think that will take a lot of persuasion to win Liz over!

On a lighter note I thought you might be interested in some of the statistics for the site.  There are 18 followers, and today’s page view by country looks like United Kingdom 90, Canada 28, Taiwan 11, Australia 1, and France 1. The most popular blog is ‘Early days’ with 199 page views.  The all page grand total is 3033.

Bye for now,