Kidnapped
I have very nearly reached my goal of 100k in May, raising £250 for the MS Society. Today I pushed 5k in the Rocinante, my trusty manual wheelchair, and tomorrow I push my final 5k to reach 100k, on the very last day of May.
I was a little behind my plan owing to climate change and the record breaking May heatwave the UK has endured in the past week. Last weekend I was at a wedding and I could barely walk with the temperatures so high, and pushing the Roci in the heat is a considerable challenge. So I decided to take a few days off and then push 10k yesterday to catch up.
Right at the end of my 10k adventure, a couple of friends were waiting for me at the local pub, which helpfully features right on the last hill I climb home. I pushed myself up the little hill the last few hundred metres and finally reached my destination, a well-deserved pint waiting for me at the table. My friends spotted me from inside and started waving to get my attention.
And watched as a man we didn’t know, smiling, kidnapped me.
Sitting in the chair, having just arrived, I am looking for my friends when I suddenly feel hands on the chair and the unmistakable force of acceleration as the chair flies uphill. I know this feeling instantly for what it is. Some kind hero has taken it upon themselves to take control of the chair for me. The sheer speed is unusual, though, and I quickly realise this kind gentleman is sprinting us up the hill toward… well who knows where we’re going. I shout: ‘I’m actually heading to the pub!’ but he can’t hear me over the sounds of traffic and I assume his heroic blood pumping in his ears.
We get a good 50 metres up the hill before he realises he has no idea where we’re going, and he slows a little to say ‘I realise I actually don’t know where you live!’
This is a fun interaction for me, because when he realises the series of bad assumptions he has made he’s going to feel pretty weird and I’ll get to enjoy his awkwardness. This kind guy has assumed I’m heading home, presumably from going to a local shop to buy disabled-people food, and he’s confident that helping me home can only help my day become a little easier. Of course I’m at kilometre 95 of a charity roll and also on my regular workout and I’m not sure I can count these 50 metres toward my goal or toward my workout. In fact it’s like him seeing someone riding a stationary bike in the gym, deciding that it looks difficult, and jumping on the seat with them to peddle for a bit. Thumbs up, my good man, no notes.
This kindly stranger has also assumed that I’m going home, even though I have slowed to a stop at the door to a pub. There is no world where I might be going to see friends, or to get drunk, or to make bad decisions. You know, the kind of things that most people do at the pub.
This dude also assumed that he could put hands on the chair without my consent. This one is a bit trickier. The chair is an extension of my body, literally. The Rocinante is a part of me in a fundamental sense. When someone wants to put their bag on my chair when I’m not using it, I’m generally pretty affronted. For me, it’s like seeing someone seated and putting your bag on them because their lap doesn’t appear to be in use. Touching the chair is an act of intimacy. To this guy, the chair is like any other and taking hold of it is akin to moving furniture even if someone is sitting on it at the time, but to me it’s closer to grabbing hold of the wrist of a woman and running uphill with her. The experience really is that strange.
But it’s also so weirdly familiar. When the chair accelerates I instantly recognise someone I don’t know has grabbed me by the wrist and is taking me somewhere else. It happens all the time.
As we fly uphill at full sprinting speed, this guy beaming the whole way, I take off my headphones and when he slows enough to ask where I’m going I say ‘actually I was heading to the pub’. He looks a little awkward and offers to push me back down the hill, to which I tell him that I can push myself, and he hesitantly asks how fast I can go. I leave him at the top as I fly at speed back down the hill it’ll take him a little while to descend, wheels are so much better than legs downhill.
When I reach the pub there’s a step inside, so I get out of the chair to push it inside and his face reveals his final thwarted assumption. He did not expect that I could walk. In fact, I regularly walk the Roci up this hill because it is pretty steep and my shoulders appreciate the break.
The final 5K tomorrow ends this mighty 100K challenge in May, just before I head to a retreat next weekend to make fellow MS friends.
And for sure they’re going to laugh when I tell them this story.
There is still time to donate to my 100K effort in May: https://www.themay50k.co.uk/fundraisers/corasargeant/the-may-50k