I was in Chipping Sodbury yesterday with someone who needs to use a mobility scooter to get about. The road through the middle of town is not excessively busy and for an able-bodied person there are few waits and no real problems. For a person with disabilities it is a very different story.
There are a few places where it is suitable to cross this very wide road and wait safely in the middle if traffic is coming from the other direction. We got by the road to cross and something really shocked me: people weren’t stopping to let us cross. Not just a few thoughtless drivers. Lots of them.
Unless they were all suffering from tunnel vision – and given what happened I would not be altogether surprised – motorist after motorist deliberately chose not to stop for a few seconds to let us cross. Why are we like this?
I suppose there will be many and varied reasons. Some people will be desperate to get to wherever they are going as soon as possible and will not want to stop for anything. Some, presumably, will assume that the bloke in the car behind (or the woman) will stop instead. It may not occur to some people that it would be nice if they stopped, others don’t give a toss. I was disappointed.
The more I have learned about disability, of debilitating illnesses and diseases and the effects of growing old, the more I have despaired at the apparent disinterest in the attitudes of those who are lucky not to fit into any of these categories. Yet.
Part of me wanted to have a pop at the non stoppers, to let them know what I thought of them. Another part of me, the greater part of me, decided not to make a fuss, to draw attention to what was going on. I suspect it will take a lot more than me ranting to make things better.
I do not know if it is a generational thing but the people who finally did stop were generally young and the ones who didn’t were all, without exception, older and sometimes just plain old.
Is it a by product of this Margaret Thatcher/Gordon Gekko world where everyone is is in it for themselves and sod everyone else? I honestly don’t know but if people cannot be bothered to carry out a very minor act of kindness, what will they be like if they are asked to do something more demanding and more substantial? Last year, I was driving through the city centre saw an old person fall over and people carried on as if she wasn’t there, leaving her to scramble back to her feet, unaided. Can we not have a good look at ourselves in the mirror?
For a short time, I was in the world of someone less mobile and it was not a nice experience. The person who I was with said it was a common occurrence and I should just forget about it, but I can’t. I do worry about us as a society sometimes and this was yet another reason why.
