We went to see Cress in her amateur dram production of Abandonement.
I’ve not seen an AmDram production before, I don’t think, so didn’t know what to expect. How would you even begin to know whether a friend is a talented actress?
Or what the other actors would be like?

I was amazed by how good they all were.

Maybe the West End calls?

I don’t think there are many SCI actors, so I won’t be thinking of giving it a go.

After the play, and just a short push from Dani, was the party that I was talking about and ( sadly ) dreading.

To my relief when we got there, no one would answer the door, so it was definitely a case of ‘ phew, I have an excuse not to go ‘.
Dani persisted, and we did get in a few minutes later, me being confronted by quite a few people standing up and spread around, there being a step and there being grass, and there being a dance floor in a part of the garden ( yes, a big garden )
I sort of looked on and focussed on the things that I couldn’t do, especially not going anywhere near the dance floor.

James and Bev had pushed the boat out for sure ( no pun intended, James having 2 Olympic gold medals for rowing )
Two other gold medallists were there two, one more recognisable than the other, and a fair sprinkling of very tall blokes, all former oarsmen. There was one very small fella, also an Olympic gold medalist, and obviously a Cox.. him crying on the podium with the Searle brothers towering over him in 1992, in Barcelona, is still fresh in my mind.
There wasn’t much difference in height between him and I, me being sat down.

I did know a lot of the people there, which was good, though I am still embarrassed about the presence of the wheelchair that I am always attached to, so I’m not exactly outgoing.

After an hour or so, a lovely lady called Rachel proposed I ‘ dance ‘ with her, which I resisted, as it’s not quite the same dancing sat down.
Rachel didn’t take no for an answer and after a bit just pushed me over to the floor against my will, and started pulling me around.
It was about 2 hours later that left that floor, during which I’d been swung around by the hand by pretty much everyone, and run over most people’s feet.

The music was great and although I felt different, of course, I definitely didn’t feel excluded. And I met some lovely people as well as seeing some that I hadn’t seen for ages.

Thanks to everyone there for making me feel a lot better about myself, and especially to Rachel for giving me no choice.

Last night my buddy, Marky P, and my school friend, Lisa J ( whom I’ve not seen since my 18th bday Toga party… ) took me / came with me to see Michael Foale speak.

He’s a British astronaut and has been in Space 6 times.
What a lovely guy he seemed, too.
I suppose when they pick people to go to Space to live and work with other astronauts in close confinement for long periods, they have to choose easy going types. Heated arguments in space might not be the best thing.
He did say that his wife said he’d come back from Space ‘ a nicer person’ – especially after he was there for the first crash between 2 ‘ Space ships’ ( well one was the Mir space station ) and you can imagine how scary that was.
He almost certainly wondered whether they’d all die, or die later after being trapped in Space until they ran out of supplies. After surviving that, I think it would make you relaxed about most things, once back on Earth.

There was another speaker who talked about the effect of Space on vision and the eye.
Given my profession, that was pretty interesting too. Basically the build up of fluid in the brain would most likely make you increasingly long sighted ( you’d find it harder and harder to read ) the longer you were in Space. She didn’t say whether they send up increasingly stronger pairs of reading glasses for the astronauts…but that would be the obvious thing to do. Perhaps the next rocket launch ought be sponsored by Specsavers?
It was funny to see what happens to your hair in Space too – the weightlessness means it grows straight up, so everyone looks like Bart Simpson after a bit.

I saw my Yukon 1000 partner yesterday – crazy bugger has just finished a 2700 mile unsupported mountain bike race.
The idiot wants to do a 5,000 mile race next year. Not everyone’s cup of tea, but Rob is used to long periods between showers.
Congrats to him on his race finish, and congrats to Pia for getting a 1st in her degree ( not just a pretty face after all…)

Great to see Charlie P too.

The picture is of the astronaut and myself. I wonder who will be the first paralysed person in space? I could move around a lot easier up there.
Maybe that’s the answer?

So I’m awake at 4.30 and I’m thinking about a party that we’re invited to in a few days.

This is what it’s like at a party in a wheelchair –

You can’t ‘ circulate’ – any movement, in any direction risks you bumping into somebody’s ankles, or somebody stepping back, not knowing you’re suddenly behind them, and tripping over you.
So you can’t move.

Most houses seem to have a step, or steps between rooms, so you stay in the room that you’re put in when you get there.

If you do move then you have to try to politely interrupt people’s conversations to get past, at which point everyone is saying sorry to you.

You don’t really know where to look, as if you do catch someone’s eye, it sort of obliges them to talk to you, when perhaps they’d rather not.

If you don’t know someone, it’s very unlikely that you’ll strike up a conversation with them, due to the drastic height difference.

If they do come and talk to you, then you hope that they’ll sit down so that they can hear you, and the relationship is more equal.

If they do sit down, then you’re thinking ‘ are they now trapped here, feeling unable to escape?’

Going to the toilet is always awkward, as no one has a loo on the ground floor that’s big enough to get into, and then close the door, and definitely not big enough to spin around, reopen the door and come out again.

Basically, you feel like you just don’t fit, so best avoided.

Two days ago I finished a course of double dose antibiotics for a UTI. It seemed to have successfully cleansed me of infection.

Tonight I once more have a bladder infection. It seems that I just cannot be rid of them any more, and explains the violent spasms that I’ve yet again endured this evening, that are impossible to ignore.

Tomorrow it’ll no doubt be worse, limiting what I can do.

Sometimes I feel very, very trapped.
Tonight is one of those nights.

I wonder if you’re claustrophobic, and then end up in a wheelchair, whether the confinement that is paralysis, makes you feel eternally claustrophobic ?

My day was OK, as far as my days go, but my mind wanders to unpleasant places.

I’m reading a ( factual ) book about the first case of murder on a train in Britain. That was in 1864. I imagine there have may been lots since, given that was 152 years ago, but perhaps not.
It’s not exactly an upbeat tale, but neither was the one written by the brain surgeon that I’ve just finished. I think of my late partner, Selcuk, who almost certainly had a type of tumour against which he stood no chance, whatever the medical intervention, and of another friend now fairly riddled with cancer.

I’m at that age where friends and contemporaries will start to die of things. A friend of a friend ( a healthy guy ) just died in his sleep very recently ( funeral yesterday ). He was 56. It’s a good way to go, but nothing about it is good for those left behind.

‘ As long as you’ve got your health ‘ my Nan and very many elderly people that I met through work, have said.
When you’re young and fit, those words have very little impact on you.
It’s not until you actually lose your own health that you have any idea of the absolute truth in those few words.

My spasms, which had mercifully subsided for a few days, allowing half decent sleep too, have this afternoon returned with a vengeance.
The option of distracting myself through Triking has gone too, as the mechanism with which I propel myself has fallen apart, and may take a bit of time to fix.

I had, I felt, gone a little way closer to finding just a little bit of inner peace…. but I know that I am prone to speaking too soon.

The Toulon cycling Crew bade farewell to Johnny B and Mrs B yesterday as they move to Spain – they’ll be missed.

I saw someone that has returned to GB today though, in my friend Mary, after her spell in Oz.
It’s good to have her back.

Thanks to Neal n Debs too.

Work tomorrow will hopefully have some beneficial effect, though I don’t think there’s any psychological element to my bloody spasms. If smiling them away was possible I’d grin the whole day through.

I’m reading a book, written by a brain and spinal cord surgeon.
His job deals with life and death every day, operations going well, and operations going badly.

He talks about the dilemma he has inside, when operating, knowing that he may well keep patients alive, but in varying states of disability.

I took a picture of one of the pages of the book.

It obviously got me wondering what was going on in the minds of the surgeons that kept me alive in France, given they told my relatives that it was very possible that IF I woke up, I might be severely mentally disabled.

On Saturday we drove to Wales, having been invited by my bro, Stu, and my sis in law, Mandy.
He’d arranged for my aunties, Gill and Rose, and my uncles, Mike and Den, to be there too, along with my nephews, Sam and Ben.

I don’t see my relatives very often now, and my girls don’t get to meet them much at all.
When I do see them, it takes me back to my childhood, and all the very funny stories from our past. Welsh people and their banter and completely inappropriate irreverence, are unique, I’m sure.

It’s clear that my injury has had a profound effect on members of my family in Wales, me being probably one of the last people that would be suited to being wheelchair bound.

My children are now taller than most of their Welsh relatives, which is funny to see.

I’m sure we’ll make the effort to see more of them from now on.

I gave my speech,which seemed well received ( they laughed at all the correct times and fell quiet at the not so happy bits ) and I shook a lot of little hands.
After a bit I switched from handshakes to High Fives… which proved to be more popular – shaking hands isn’t particularly natural for under 10’s, whereas slapping a hand really hard does seem to be.

Beaming little faces are a tonic for pretty much everything, so I had a good time.

Thanks to the school for inviting me.

Along with yet another raging UTI, I’m at Lily’s school Sports Day.
She’s disappointed to get silvers in the Long Jump and Sprint Hurdles, but did clean up convincingly in the 100metres.

She definitely gets her speed from my side of the family, not her Mum’s side – the girls get their looks and intelligence from Dani – so I feel proud that a bit of me is winning, still.

I think I’m the only parent here, or was, now that a few more have just turned up.

All the kids have suddenly turned into adults ( physically )though most of the boys are still pretty scrawny.

Last night, before I started to feel very unwell ( again ) we attended the school prize giving, seeing Lily collect the ( most important ) prize, the Drama prize – at least Lily told me it was the most prized prize.

Me being me, I’m watching the Sports Day events and trying to guage which ones I’d have won if the 15 year old me could have been here.

I took my own Sports Day’s very seriously, only being in it to win it, and then absolutely bereft if/ when I didn’t come first in everything I entered. I then lived in internal and unspoken shame until the following year, and a chance to redeem myself.

Lily has just missed out on winning the girls’ Year overall athletic Prize. Had she jumped only 2cm further in the Long Jump, she’d have got it, and her name engraved on the trophy for ever more.
That margin of closeness would have haunted me for life, I think, but Lily is far more relaxed about it, which is definitely a good thing. I’m very proud of her in so many ways. As she is the youngest in her year ( as I was ) she’ll be at a physical disadvantage still, in terms of growth and strength, so has done really well.

Tomorrow I’ve been invited to make a short speech and give out the prizes in my children’s’ primary school. I’m very touched to have been asked, the first parent to have been, it appears.
As the volume of my voice is seeming to be getting weaker again, I’m relieved there is a microphone. I have written down what I’ll say, but may end up ad libbing a bit too.
There’ll be a bit of a palava getting me and/in my chair up the steps to the level of the pulpit area, and there I’ll stay for the whole proceedings, until they get me down again, old churches not having been built to be wheelchair accessible.

It was Amber’s Sports Day today too, and she’d made it clear that parental attendance would be very unwelcome… in her own ‘spirited’ way.
She did do well in the unusual combination of the Shot put and the 80m sprint, coming second in both ( tho disappointed with the Shot result, as she is usually the strongest put’er in her year )
The spit of her sister in looks and height, she is not the same body composition, Amber being a lot stronger.
I’m sure if she could convert her power into a more relaxed delivery, she could be amazing.
But I adore her either way.