It is lunchtime in the bistro at Belong and half a dozen toddlers are tucking into sausage cassoulet, mash and seasonal vegetables. Anyone acquainted with the table manners of two- and three-year-olds may well be bracing themselves for carnage. Yet green beans are being happily pronged with forks rather than chucked on the floor and some faces don’t even need a wipe. To underline this dining miracle: one little girl is wearing a white top that survives a tomato-based sauce.
For this remarkable scene we can thank the calming presence of Bill Wall, who sits in the middle drinking a cappuccino and gently encouraging the children to have a few more mouthfuls. This 87-year-old former electrician has become one of the children’s “grandfriends” – “our Bill”, they call him. Since he moved into the intergenerational community in Chester last year, he spends almost as much time down in the nursery as up in his care home suite.
