Last weekend we took a family trip to Snailbeach in Shropshire. We were going to a Curlew Lantern Making Workshop (which was most excellent, in case you want to know). On the way there, the Sat Nav took us down the wrong road. It was taking us ‘as the crow flies’ rather than along the sorts of roads that cars should regularly go down, i.e. those with tarmac. The road it took us down (which turned out to be a dead end) was extremely bumpy and pot-holed. It reminded me of a similar road in Charlbury which when we lived there we affectionately called ‘the bumpy way’ (Crawborough Road). I used to walk down that road quite frequently with number one child in a pushchair if I wanted said child to drift off to sleep. It was a road that you would want to avoid if you were in a car. It was a road that small babies love.
A random bumpy road
Later that night, I had a weird thought. What if we could all describe ourselves as a road, what road would we choose? I decided that my husband would be the M1 (dependable and important, like a backbone and if out of action the result is chaos). My eldest son would be the M54 (straight, steady, comforting, predictable). My middle son is definitely the M5 (slow, especially in good weather, and likely to cause big delays, but brings much joy in the end). My youngest is without a doubt the M6 (noisy, busy, stressful, but never, ever dull).
The M5 on a good day
Perhaps I had this weird thought because I love motorways (just like my dad).
Does he look like the M5?
I’m not a motorway, I’m the road we drove along in Snailbeach, or ‘the bumpy way’ in Charlbury: unpredictable, totally impractical, a little annoying and likely to cause much damage to your car.
A bumpy car
So, what road would you be?
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