29th June: Driving with rappers.


Wednesday 29th June
VC Day, Van Collection Day. In her Ford Ka Georgie drives us towards Hinckley to meet, greet and drive away the van.  The last three letters on the number plate are ROH so we’ve tenuously and unimaginatively called him Ross.  “Hello Ross, it’s good to, er, have you,” I say politely, if a little formally.  Ross stays silent, just giving me a pale, blank stare. 

A few weeks ago, Chris, the salesman, had waved his hand informatively at all the switches, pumps and sleeping positions but I’d retained little of the operational logistics. “Can you just go through the important bits again? Please.”  Chris is patient and explains twenty-eight things to me that I swear he’s never told me before.  On the plus side I’ve not forgotten how to drive and after giving Chris a kiss and a hug goodbye I head off on the Coventry Road, towards Leicester, followed by Georgie.  I drive slowly around roundabouts, I stall once, I clip one curb and choose to keep the radio silent.  “Thank you Ross, that was good,” I say aloud as I arrive back at our Leicester house. Our first twelve miles are over; we have consummated.

Having not driven for eighteen months I’m keen to show off my Richard Hammond skills by driving to Timbuktu.  Instead, we settle on the twenty miles to my brother Yash’s house in Belton-in-Rutland.  Mile by mile, I get used to the large steering wheel, the five-metre length and the extra views you get being higher than most other vehicles.  But Yash and his wife, Maggie, are not in.  We decide to drive a further twenty-four miles to Welby, four miles east of Grantham, to see my mum and new-dad.  New is hardly the right adjective for new-dad as he was ‘new’ forty-two years ago.

Outwardly, the parents seem pleased to see their oldest child, grandchild and the van.  Inwardly, they are probably not too impressed that their unemployed, penniless, middle-aged, single-parent of a daughter has chosen to live in a van; it’s hardly a dream you have for your kids and probably won’t be divulged at the golf club.  We raid their carb-cupboard, chat for half an hour and then head back to Leicester.  Georgie’s bought a device to allow the tunes on her phone to play via the van’s radio so we travel down the A1 and the A47 singing along to Kanye and JayZ.   Life is good, very good.

Next week I will be living in the van.  Will life be as good then?

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