I use a wheelchair, and I would rather ask about the step now

I use a wheelchair, and in this city that means the question I have to ask early is one nobody enjoys being asked. Is there a step. How many. Is the bathroom upstairs. I put it in the first letter now, because asking in week six, after somebody has become fond of me, is far worse for both of us than asking it before either of us has anything invested.

Thirty seven, Salford, five years in, one arrangement of eighteen months.

What I have found is that the answer matters much less than the way it is given. Two women told me plainly that their house would not work and suggested what might, and both of those conversations were completely fine. The ones that go wrong are where somebody insists it can be managed because they do not want to seem unkind, and then it cannot be, and by then we are four months in and somebody has to be disappointed.

What I want is a structured arrangement with standing duties I can genuinely do. I work full time, I run my own household, and there is a long list of things I am useful for. There is also a short list of things I am not, and you can have both lists in the first fortnight.

What I do not want is to be admired for managing. Nothing about my life is remarkable, and being told otherwise is the quickest way to make me stop writing.