Why I keep on heading for a fall
WHEN I was 17, I taught myself how to fall flat on my face. I perfected the technique in the front room on my own. At first falling forward with arms extended to cushion my trajectory, then withdrawing my arms a bit at a time, until I could keep them by my side until the last minute before breaking my fall.
Perhaps I had been inspired by old-time comedy actor Danny Ross who could fall flat and bounce back upright without missing a line of dialogue in early comedy films and TV sitcoms with Arthur Askey and Jimmy Clitheroe.
Whatever the reason, I never found the need to use this secret skill in public and the only time I displayed it to my pals Dave and Tony they were distinctly unimpressed whilst concentrating on
HOLD pal Alan Whitehead (he’s almost as old as me) enjoyed reading about the recent shopping expedition into town, undertaken by my wife and I, after the reopening of non-essential shops.
He commented: “In essence, all we need are three shops: Specsavers, Boots the Chemist and Greggs: specs, drugs and sausage rolls.”
Alan always had a way with words. looking 18 in the public bar of the local pub.
When I did it to show off to a girlfriend she thought I’d come over all funny and had collapsed. Shame the kiss of life hadn’t been invented in 1958. She never thought to try it.
I recalled this latent attribute this week because I have started falling over without intending to do so. Sort of free-falling around our house. It happened as I crossed the room to open the front door. My wife Maria and sister-in-law Virginia watched through the window as I went down like a sack of cement. No hands out to save me this time and, instead of being a lightweight eight-and-a-half stone as in my youth, I am now 11 stone. The house shook, and so did I.
This has happened three or four times recently. Severe sciatica last year damaged the nerves in my left foot causing what is called footdrop. This means my foot dangles so that I have to wear a splint on my left leg, that fits in my shoe, and keeps my lower limb at the requisite right angle for me to be able to walk normally. Still with me?
Without it, I have to lift the left leg like a competing show pony in dressage.
The splint can become a little wearisome so I occasionally take it off and wander around at home in my socks. Unfortunately, if I forget the proper dressage lift, my toes drag on the carpet and I fall without warning and with no chance to use my arms to cushion my collapse.
Thank goodness I have retained enough Danny Ross bounce, perfected on the football fields of England, so that nothing has so far broken.
On this latest occasion, I managed to catch the digits of my other foot as well and bent my right big toe so severely the end now glows like the Northern Lights set in a base of bruising the colour of Bisto gravy.
My body is obviously trying to tell me something important, probably to do with growing old disgracefully, and yet I haven’t had an alcoholic drink since Christmas.
Perhaps, all those years ago in my teens, I was driven to practise frontroom free-falling by a subconscious preparation for what was to come.
So thanks Danny Ross for the inspiration of bouncing back against the vicissitudes of life.
From now on I shall wear my splint at all times and have also given up tap-dancing. I had to; I kept falling into the sink.