Wheels
Ever since I can remember I have been fascinated with wheels, whether it be a bike, a scooter, a trolley, a pushchair, and once legally old enough, cars. My siblings are witness to the fact that I was obsessed for a time with wheelchairs! I am blessed that so far I have never needed one! Nevertheless, on long walks as a small child with my grandma, my tiny legs would tire, and I would dream of the comfort I envisaged that a chair on wheels would bring!
When I was two years old, I shared a toy tractor with a steering wheel, with the other children in our street. I loved that tractor, steering it around in the scorching summer of ’76, my imagination running wild. I learned to ride a bike without stabilizers at the age of 6. A boyfriend of my mother at the time taught my sister and I how to balance on our new bikes, no doubt gifts from Father Christmas! It didn’t take long before I was wheel-born!
Fast forward (at the speed limit) seventeen years and I was taking my driving lessons. It was a no brainer that I would learn to drive, I was fascinated with cars and driving and couldn’t wait to be behind the wheel. I passed first time, back in the day when you didn’t have to sit through a PHD in driving theory and change a tyre while re calibrating the fan belt. I will never forget what my instructor said, as he exchanged places with the examiner at the driving centre. He told me that the man had reported that he wished there were more learners like me! I was delighted.
I wasted no time in building up my speeding fines, none of which I am proud of, but I hasten to add, all committed in a 70 mile an hour limit, usually going just over, and never in a built-up area, where pedestrians and children are. I’m not sure that makes my offense any less serious, but I didn’t want the vision of me racing past children’s schools to be the first image you come to. I have never been committed of any other road traffic offenses and only have three points now.
My first car was a Renault 19, bought from my sister and I spent many a time, in the early months of driving, avoiding uphill starts! I must have added miles onto my journeys to minimize the stalling times and the red-faced panic this caused, when traffic behind waited for me to grapple with the clutch bite. After my Renault, my circumstances changed and I was suddenly without wheels so for a short period, I went back to the bicycle, this time with a baby seat and my three-year-old son on the back!
This kept me fit until I then splashed out on a diarrhoea coloured metro, where, after the first day driving it from the garage, the exhaust fell off. A week later the fan belt snapped. After a year I was using the boot to lean in, and open the driver’s side to get in, since all the locks failed. This car had the old manual choke, which I resorted to almost always, to chug life into the old heap. It got me where I needed to go back when I was training to be a nurse and ferrying my son to childcare and me to whatever hospital I was placed at.
As I progressed with work and my career, this reflected in the wheels I owned. While still working in the hospitals and now exhausted by the metro and the acrobatic skills required just to climb in, I invested in a red Rover, GSI and I was in love. Of all the cars I have owned, I think I have the most fondness for this one. It was a significant upgrade from the metro since I could get in it via the door, and it didn’t have a manual choke. The exhaust was attached, another bonus, and it didn’t look like I had evacuated my bowels all over the bonnet like its predecessor.
I think perhaps my keenness with the accelerator started with this car because of the sporty nature of the drive. I went to more than a handful of speeding seminars in this car. It was with a broken heart that eventually I would give up my Rover, when, as my career took me into district nursing, I was offered a lease car as part of the job. The benefit of this was that with NHS discount I could get a brand-new car every three years for a fraction of the normal price.
I was free to choose any wheels I wanted! There was a Toyota, a Citroen, a couple of Audi’s, the latter were my absolute favourite. A little tip when driving a brand-new Audi, with less than 10 miles on the clock; don’t travel to a theme park and drive amongst the animals. A group of Orangutans took off with my windscreen wipers. I later had an embarrassing conversation with my insurance.
When my career changed direction and I was no longer eligible for a lease car, I invested in my own little Audi A3, and drove this right until the last 4 years, when I was gifted a Fabia by my generous father! This little diesel was a wolf in sheep’s clothing, since the exterior was a Skoda, but the engine was an Audi; I wasn’t yet ready to cut ties with my Audi partnership. I had been driving this until only last year, in the winter, when my father gave me his Skoda Yeti, a bigger beast of a car with a two-litre engine and turbo. You would be astounded to know that I’ve yet to get a speeding fine in this car… watch this space.
