Autumn is here, all the leaves are brown and the sky is blue…

Autumn 2019

Well summer has slipped away and the leaves on the trees are fading into yellow, red and gold – a delightful spectacle and a joy to behold.

We’ve had a number of visitors over the summer and the last ones to go home were Karen’s daughter Leighann, complete with bump, and partner Danny. Danny worked his socks off while he was here and proved a great help to us both. While they were here I spent most of a day in hospital in Aubusson  having a swollen and bruised right leg looked at. Guess what? This fool had only broken his leg – a spiral fracture of my right tibia! How did I manage that you might ask – easily says I! About 4 weeks ago I was turning round in my wheelchair in the back of the spaz wagon and my footplate and foot caught the sub-frame of one of the jump seats fixed to the side wall of the van. The click I heard I dismissed as metal on metal but in fact turned out to be my shin splintering! So I’m now wrapped in a fibre glass cast from my toes to above my knee until mid December. Fortunately the Doctor set the cast with a slight bend at the knee so I could continue to get in my lift, if he’d have set it straight as he wanted I wouldn’t have been able to get up and down to the bedroom and bathroom. It’s a good job my French has improved enough that I could make sure he understood that problem. It makes having a shower a bit more of an ordeal than usual because I don’t want to get the inside of the cast wet.  My solution – wrap it up in cling film and then take care with the spray – what a palaver!

We’ve got more visitors coming in October – friends Andrew and Jane from London are due the first week. Jane has been out to us already but I haven’t seen Andrew since October 2017 when we flew back for some hospital appointments and I’m really looking forward to catching up with him again. Andrew enjoys some reflected glory from his niece Izzy Christiansen, ex Manchester City Ladies, now of Olympique Lyon and, of course, England.

The back end of October will see Karen’s sister Ann and husband Pete come a ’calling again. They have been regular and always welcome visitors, great company and great help. Pete is a fellow bike rider and has recently joined North West Blood Bikes  – a marvellous outfit saving lives every day of the week – nice work Pete.

As we move into October so Brexit stumbles inexorably onwards towards Johnson’s dead in a ditch date of 31st October. Karen and I have both received a letter from the NHS advising what we need to do to ensure continuation of healthcare after the 31st, deal or no deal. The letter makes many references to a no-deal Brexit, even though that is now illegal following the passing of the Benn Bill on 6th September. The letter from the NHS is dated 23rd September 2019 which raises a number of alarms in our heads.

I have posted the full text below for you to look at but with only a matter of weeks to go am I the only one who thinks this is too little to late! Us ex-pats feel like pawns in a nasty game.

To close on a more upbeat note Karen and I enjoyed a 4 course lunch with pretty much all the local community yesterday (Sunday 29th September). The Mayor – Serge – had arranged a bit of a vintage and veteran car and tractor show and for 14€ a head we were fed royally and he personally made sure our wine didn’t run out. There were some great old cars and vans on show and a marvellous array of old tractors – all working and all still hard at work. We often see old French cars bobbing about, especially in the summer and we have a neighbour who must be at least 80 who still goes out in her immaculate Citroen 2CV.  There’s none of that nonsense about taking your test again when you hit 75 here as there is in the UK so the roads are fair play for all.  MoT’s are every 2 years and motorbikes don’y have to have an MoT.  The French seem to love the motorist – you can even buy little cars that don’t need a license – the drivers of which are usually on a ban for one reason or another.

I think what really impressed us most yesterday, in fact impresses us every day is the sense of community that exists here. Everybody gets together whenever they can, sometimes for the simplest of reasons and everyone helps everyone else. Unfortunately it seems to me that only a disaster brings people together back in the UK and the gulf Brexit is driving between people will, I truly believe, destroy any sense of community for decades.

I was hoping to close on an upbeat note but maybe not now as the poison that is Brexit has got to me again.

There’s an election coming soon so please make sure all your nearest and dearest have registered to vote and then exercise that right. The behaviour of the current leadership and government of the UK is beyond appalling and must be halted.

I’ll speak to you all again soon but please feel free to contact me if you have anything to say about my blog.

Yours

Jem