The Moth is no stranger to accidents – one could say he was accident prone; although in someone who works as long and hard as he does, one could also say the probability of damaging oneself were higher.

By the time he was ten he had almost severed a finger, been pushed into a canal and nearly drowned, and inadvertently set fire to the house; in all these incidents he was trying to perform tasks he was too young for – slicing bread when he could barely see over the table, trying to break up a fight and attempting to warm the house for his family, all still abed.

Climbing a tree is something most boys do, and on this occasion the Moth was just being a boy.

Falling out of the tree wasn’t part of the game, and for several minutes he lay completely winded. When he could breathe again, he found he couldn’t walk.

So he crawled home, a distance of two miles. The boys who he was with ran ahead to break the tidings to his mother, who came with the same pram she had wheeled him to the doctor in when he had cut his finger.

It is always the shame of being wheeled in the pram that remains with the Moth; but he had crawled most of the distance before the pram and his mother arrived.

 He was taken to hospital, where a broken back was diagnosed.

He stayed there flat on his back for six weeks. There was no television in hospital then, and no screens, devices, mobile phones, or any other form of digital entertainment.

The Moth learned to accept his fate, read, enjoy whatever company came his way, and to ponder on life in general.

Six months were spent in a plaster cast, at the end of which time he emerged, pale, back slightly crooked, but unbeaten.

The accidents continued through our married life.

He joined a soccer team comprised of much younger men, fell while tackling for the ball, and broke his wrist. He was working as a concreter’s off sider at the time, and while he tried valiantly to cart wheelbarrow loads of concrete around, had to give up and rest his wrist.

There was the time he pursued a marauding dog intent on killing our chickens around a bush in the back paddock, slipping and breaking his ankle.

He was in a more sedentary line of work then, and didn’t miss a day, coming in on walking sticks.

He only missed a day or two when, suffering from influenza, he became woozy getting into the bath, fainted, and broke all the ribs down one side of his body. One night in hospital was enough for him – he signed himself out the next day.

Even amateur dramatics was dangerous – more damage to his spine occurred when he was playing Ratty in a production of ‘The Wind in the Willows’, a very realistic production which involved a boat on a lake. The boat was pulled sharply, and the Moth tumbled into the bottom of it.

So coming home from walking the dogs and finding the Moth sat somewhat shakily on a stool, while my sister administered hot chocolate, was no surprise.

He wouldn’t have an ambulance, so we had to look to other wheeled sources to get him to hospital. He wasn’t subjected to the indignity of a pram, but an office chair with wheels, which got him as far as the car, as gently as we could, the Moth giving instructions all the way.

A wheelchair met us at the other end, and it soon became evident the Moth was not going to be signing himself out, or that it would be business as usual in a day or two.

He has had his pelvis pinned back together, and now faces six weeks of bed rest before he can resume activities at a modified level.

This has come as a blow to the Moth, who only has two speeds, asleep or frenetic activity.

But it is a case of déjà vu. Those long weeks as a child, away from his family and immobile, have stood him in good stead.

He faces what comes next with good humour and stoicism, enjoying such marvels as beds that can be raised or lowered, a television screen hovering overhead, and the company of a constant stream of medical staff and visitors.