I was sitting in the supermarket car
park waiting for Ava when this old lady approached and tapped
on the car window. At first I thought she was homeless and was asking for
money but then I realised that she was in fact asking for a lift
home. She wanted me to take her to Mollans sur Ouvèze. It was a very
hot afternoon and I was really tired; I'd just come through Mollans and
was on my way home. I really didn't relish the idea of going back but
she looked at me with pleading eyes and I couldn't resist her. Ava
returned with the shopping and we made the detour. I didn't get to
know our passenger's name which was surprising because we did get to
know quite a lot of other things about her. She sat in the back of
the car, leaning forward, talking incessantly in our ears.
She told us that she lived in sheltered
accommodation in Mollans but for some reason it was never made
clear why she was stranded in Buis, which is some distance if you don't
have a car. She spent a lot of the journey dissing the accommodation;
telling us how badly run it was and how they didn't care. She was quite pissed off actually. It was
really quite sad.
She was a very sweet lady but she did irritate me at one point when she did that thing - that thing of asking me where I come from - but no really where do you come from? It's that question that I either have to just ignore or go on and give a brief family history of my origins but as I said, she was sweet so I gave her the abbreviated version of my humble beginnings.
She was a very sweet lady but she did irritate me at one point when she did that thing - that thing of asking me where I come from - but no really where do you come from? It's that question that I either have to just ignore or go on and give a brief family history of my origins but as I said, she was sweet so I gave her the abbreviated version of my humble beginnings.
When we arrived at her place I told her about my project and asked
if I could take her photo. She was more than willing and started to
make funny faces and go on about how her hair wasn't coiffed. She became very youthful and 'girly', it was a brief glimpse into her past self - a delightful moment.
Hopefully next time she'll take the
free bus that the sheltered accommodation provides and not get
stranded again. And hopefully all is not as bad as she painted it!
