17th of January to 12th of March, 2021.
We drive to T.’s house because the road is too bad to go to her parents. Too much ice. The plan now is for me to finally spend some time helping her parents around and soon enough, when I can finally cross to the Isle of Lewis (because of Covid-19, only working personnel are allowed to cross freely from the main land) and when my arm is better, so I can actually to some work there. T. is looking after the 8 puppies from her yellow Labrador, Tala. They are all black and super cute. It is such a shame that I cannot play properly with them.
When I first meet P. and J. I like them immediately. Something tells me I will get along with J.. She is cute and super funny. She always creaks me with the slightly dark humor. And P. likes to tell us about some History and only a bit about his tales. I wish that for the time I spent with them, I could have learnt more about his life experience, mainly about the time he was in the Korea war, leading a group of soldiers, when he was only 18 years old. Impressive!
Fosshouse is an amazing place, located in a gorgeous area. We overview the Loch Tummel and the Schiehallion Mountain and I have to tell you, everywhere I look I see a pretty view. It is incredible! I can barely believe that I am actually staying in here. The house itself is also gorgeous. Everywhere, all the rooms, the kitchen, the bathrooms, everything is so beautiful and tidy, well decorated and with this glamours air of a fancy country house.
My room is also amazing with a great view to the loch, a wonderful bed, great armchairs and even a bathtub! I have so many interesting books to read and so many puzzles to do that I don’t know for where to start.
But I start by working, of course. I want to be of use, even though if it is with only one arm.
The first few days I few quite a bit pain on my wrist. I was not doing a lot of effort but I think that lack of any exercises at all for the last weeks, it was trick to return to my normal routine.
I am being very careful because I don’t want to make anything worse. I know I have to push myself to get better but I cannot imagine of having some issues with my recovering just because I am being imprudent. So I take it easy.
I get along pretty well with Beauly, the German Shepard of the family. I love her and it seems she loves me too. I feel sorry that I cannot play very much with her right now but I take her for long walks everyday.
On those walks, I feel actually quite nervous because I am afraid that I will slip in the ice again. Actually it takes me quite a long time to lose the fear of simply walking around.
I have my own small kitchen upstairs so I prepared my own food most of the time. I am invited for dinner by P. and J. quite a few times though. And I also cook a few meals for them. It is a curious situation we have with the delivery of the food though. It comes via Tesco trucks but it always fool of surprises. We make fun out of it because it is like we can never know what can happen.
The winter is very strong and we have a lot of snow. Everything looks gorgeous under this thick white coat. It is the first time I am in the countryside, with such an amazing landscape all covered in snow. It is stunning!
After a few weeks I have to go to town and replace my current plaster cast for a wrist splint. Taking out the stitches it was not so bad but also not a walk in the park. I have to admit that when I saw it my wrist for the first time after the surgery I was shocked and got very concerned. From my point of view the position it was not good at all from any perspective. Because of that I though I would never recover well and being so, never be able to have a normal life again: meaning I would not be able to keep travelling as I was doing.
I spend one week in T.’s house after this first visit to the hospital, for a kind of quarantine. I meet the neighbors and their kids, three girls. They are Scottish but were living in Bali for many years, Quite a change of scenery.
I am now doing wrist and fingers exercises everyday, three times per day. I feel miserable at the beginning because it seems I can do almost nothing. But I don’t give up. After watching some videos I figure that it is quite normal to feel like that but that progress come with time for the ones who really push themselves up. And I do it. I also had a lot of support from J.’s part. With her dark humor, she would ask me in the morning if my arm was still there or if it had fallen off during the night. She used to be an tennis player on her youth, so she knows much more about injuries than I. With her support I believed much more in my recovering and I know it made big difference for me.
My last appointment in the hospital it was for an x-ray. The nurse was surprised with my recovering and my progress with the movements. She also told me that my surgery was done by the head doctor of the orthopedics department.
One day I was playing with Beauly, throwing the ball to her and trying to catch a nice photo of her jumping in the air. I got distracted by the photo and didn’t notice that Beauly was coming in my direction. One of her front paws reach precisely at my broken wrist. I let out a scream. Not of pain exactly, but of fear. Nothing really happen after that. And until nowadays I ask myself if that incident was not meant to happen so it would “put things on place” in my wrist, in a kind of way. Who knows…
With T. and N. living in definitive in the Isle of Lewis now, they need someone to look after their house in Pitlochry until the moving out take place. A lovely couple from South England come to do that. I meet them only a few days before I finally leave to the island and I think they are really nice.
A friend of N. is going to the island for a few days so I am getting a lift with him. He has a company their so I am assigned as a helper of him, just in case the authorities are allowing only workers to cross to the islands. But at the boarding nobody asked for anything. David pick me up at T.’s House and he is a nice guy. We have a slightly long drive to the Ferry but the view and the nice conversation make it pass faster. The crossing I didn’t like though. Way too many people, in my opinion, and I felt uncomfortable.
When I left Fosshouse J. was quite sad. I felt I should leave quickly after the “goodbyes” because I saw some tears in her eyes.
