We've been car shopping. Our Ford has a manual transmission and we now need something with an automatic for Rob to drive. What an epic this has been. Talking to used car salesmen; pouring over classifieds. It didn't take long to find out that there isn't anybody out there jumping up and down to get their hands on our 3/4 T pickup that gets 13 miles to the gallon. (especially in a time when gas is as high as 2.70) We finally struck a "deal" on Saturday - that didn't really land in our favor financially. We traded our truck, for one that was a year older, similar mileage - and still had to give the dealer a few thousand dollars. Rob has been "checked out" by his OT to drive however I believe he still needs some practice. He tried to take out about four feet of a curb the other day in the new truck - and as the vehicle was pivoting around this obstacle on the snow and ice - his comment was "hmm that's wierd". Gave Elias and I both a very good laugh..... This whole blog started out with a thought about Rob's driving - and in the need to practice driving this new vehicle - we decided to go to the book store. This bookstore has a lot of memories for me over the past few months. It was a place we ventured early after his stroke and I always hated it. Rob would always want to go there because it has the best magazine selection. But my concern was that it had multi floors - stairs - and narrow sections between the books. A nightmare for someone in a wheelchair. On Saturday, when we went to the bookstore I was watching Rob maneuver through the narrow magazine section walking with his cane. He was standing tall and could reach the magazines he was interested in. I watched him very slowly and carefully squat down to reach the lower magazines as well. He selected a magazine to buy for his brother - and was able to carry it in his fingers that he held with his cane. And then it occurred to me - it was less than two months ago, that we were last in this store. His wheelchair blocked the magazine aisle - I could tell he was a huge inconvenience to other customers. He had to ask me to look for magazines on the top shelf. I had the whole picture in my mind - from the last trip in his wheelchair and this trip him walking through the narrow aisle with his cane. Oh how far we've come.