90
My Gran would've been 90 years old today if she was still alive. She was my Mum's Mum and out of all my grandparents she was the one I knew least. The last time I saw her was in 1969 (the year I left England with my immediate family for Australia) and because I was so young I don't have any strong recollections of spending time with her. In 1977 she and her second husband (she divorced her first husband, my Grandad, before I was born) booked a trip to come and visit us, but sadly she died of cancer a few months beforehand. She actually died the same day as Elvis, August 16th 1977, so that's always been there as some kind of kooky reminder
As I've grown older I've had a stronger sense of sorrow that I came so close to knowing her, but never really did. Not in the flesh anyway. I'm sure we would've spoken on the phone now and then (in the daze when you had to deal with echoes and delays) and I know we wrote to one another because I still have birthday cards and at least one letter she sent me, which I treasure. In the letter she tells me that when she was a girl she had pictures of movie stars plastered all over her walls and even on the ceiling. This small bit of information gives me a great insight and a real sense of kinship or something. I've always had pictures plastered over my walls and I've got this love of actors, which none of my siblings share. I can sometimes imagine my Gran and I talking about our favourite movies and actors even though I'm not sure we'd have similar tastes. Thankfully, adding to this image of my Gran, there's a few photos and some Super 8 films that my Dad took all those years ago. I've also asked family members to tell me what they can. My Gran had one younger sister, my Great Aunt, who's now 85 and lives in England and she's been a great source of information. One time I was staying with her and she gave me a photo of my Gran taken at a very young age. It was the first time I'd seen her as a child. The date on the back of the photo (I forget the year) was August 16
As I've grown older I've had a stronger sense of sorrow that I came so close to knowing her, but never really did. Not in the flesh anyway. I'm sure we would've spoken on the phone now and then (in the daze when you had to deal with echoes and delays) and I know we wrote to one another because I still have birthday cards and at least one letter she sent me, which I treasure. In the letter she tells me that when she was a girl she had pictures of movie stars plastered all over her walls and even on the ceiling. This small bit of information gives me a great insight and a real sense of kinship or something. I've always had pictures plastered over my walls and I've got this love of actors, which none of my siblings share. I can sometimes imagine my Gran and I talking about our favourite movies and actors even though I'm not sure we'd have similar tastes. Thankfully, adding to this image of my Gran, there's a few photos and some Super 8 films that my Dad took all those years ago. I've also asked family members to tell me what they can. My Gran had one younger sister, my Great Aunt, who's now 85 and lives in England and she's been a great source of information. One time I was staying with her and she gave me a photo of my Gran taken at a very young age. It was the first time I'd seen her as a child. The date on the back of the photo (I forget the year) was August 16
posted by nash at 10:58 PM
1 Comments:
Hi Nash,
I’m glad you’ve got your Great Aunt who’s able to tell you about your Grandmother; hopefully she’ll be able to give you enough information so that you won’t feel disconnected from a close relative. Perhaps one day you’ll have all sorts of memory images of when you last saw her in 1969 and that’ll help as well. Long term memory seems to be one of your fortes!
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