LAST week, even as the summer sun, without a hint of shame, was warming the cockles of hearts throughout the land and generally behaving as if it had been there all the time, my foot went funny – or, to be more precise, my right foot (I still have the regulation pair) went funny.
Actually, funny doesn't quite cover it. It's something like gout, it affects the big toe and while it's nothing to get hysterical about, it renders me more or less immobile, golf's out of the question and normally uneventful shopping trips have becom
e hair-raising ventures into the unknown.
I know little about gout, if that, indeed, is what it is, apart from the fact that it used to be attributed to lashings of port wine, which I don't drink for reasons we needn't go into now. According to Laurel and Hardy films, people who fell victim to gout tended in those far-off days to have their legs swathed in bandages from hip to toe. Also, immediately the bandages went on, the legs became targets for every dog, child and psychopath who happened to be in the vicinity.
A large, moustachioed actor called Billy Gilbert seemed to draw the short straw when it came to gouty roles and spent a lot of time travelling in open cars with the bad leg sticking out in an inviting fashion. The invitation was always taken up with gusto and before the film was over, the vulnerable leg had been hit by hammers, kicked by every passing citizen and crushed in car doors. Gilbert was a master of the pained expression and had an anguished scream which brought tears to the eyes.
The people who made those films knew their stuff when it came to gout. If I've learned anything during my short association with the affliction, it is that people are drawn to the affected limb like moths to flame. The moment I leave the house, I am aware of danger lurking in every nook and cranny, in every doorway and up every close. Customers leaving shops crash out like Sherman tanks and make bee-lines for my big toe.
It took only a couple of trips for me to become paranoid about things. An episode in the fish shop provided a good illustration of what can befall a gout-stricken person. As I queued, the man in front of me appeared incapable of holding his position. Though he had placed his order, he seemed fascinated by the array of fish displayed under glass in front of him and constantly sprang back to take in the bigger picture, as it were. He did so without warning and paid no heed to what was behind him, which happened to be me and my throbbing toe.
Even after he'd paid, I wasn't safe, for he backed and wheeled away from the counter in one potentially lethal movement. Fortunately, having observed his general jumpiness, I was coiled and braced for action like a threatened snake and, as he backed, so did I, at high speed, and disaster was averted by inches.
The scene outside the shop brought little respite. Children on scooters buzzed me from all directions, cyclists, who appear to prefer the pavements to the colourful reserved areas provided for them on the main roads, came out of the sun like Stuka dive-bombers and mothers with prams charged me with the air of women who weren't about to take prisoners. Perhaps my sensitive state had something to do with it, but there seemed to be an inordinate number of twins around. The prams looked vast and the toe shrank at the very sight of them.
Hopefully, this phase will pass and normal service will be resumed as soon as possible, a phrase which brings to mind a somewhat unnerving interlude which occurred during the PGA golf at Wentworth. The TV cameras were trained on Scotland's Marc Warren, who was playing a shot out of what looked like light rough. It was a clear day and the ball, when struck, was beautifully caught in flight, standing out crisp and white against a blue sky.
I had a cup of tea on hand at the time and I gave it an idle stir before glancing back at the screen. To my surprise, the ball was still there and still, apparently, making good progress against its blue background. Cor, I thought, what a shot. How about that hang-time? I was beginning to think in terms of unlikely world records when the penny dropped and I realised the screen had frozen, something had gone wrong and the ball was, in fact, going nowhere.
Eventually, someone told us there had been a power cut and they were working furiously to get things going again. I received the announcement with mixed feelings, for it's nice when astonishing things happen. I remember watching America's Bob Beamon zooming to a World long-jump record in Mexico during the 1968 Olympic Games – a record which would stand for some 24 years. If only Marc Warren's shot had been doing what I thought it was doing before all was revealed, it would have taken an air-sea rescue operation to have found the ball. Golf would never have been the same again.
The full article contains 889 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
