Grandmothers

I’ve been thinking lately about grandmothers. My best friend just became a grandmother to a sweet baby girl. Another friend’s first grandbaby (a boy) is due in a few weeks. None on my horizon as of yet, and that’s just fine (no hurry, girls!!). Update: I now have three grandchildren; two girls and a boy!

But all the grandbaby talk got me thinking about my grandmother and my mom as a grandmother.

My grandmother was British. From the “old country”. She cared for her father and siblings after her mother died and she married my grandfather, who was Scottish, when she was an “old maid”. When my mom was a young child, their family came to America. They landed in Boston and built a new life there. I grew up in Connecticut, but all of our grandparents lived outside Boston, so we visited them regularly. My grandmother (“Nana Baird”) loved us lots, but she was very proper in her mannerisms. There were women that she had known for 50 years who she still didn’t call by their first names. She wore dresses, never pants and NEVER a bathing suit! I don’t remember her ever getting down on the floor and playing with us, but maybe she did. One memory stands out, though, as being out of the ordinary. I was visiting my grandparents when I was a tween-ager and she took me to see an Elvis Presley movie! Quite a departure for my proper grandmother. She lived with us when I was a teenager and I loved going into her apartment to talk after school or on the weekends. And she made AMAZING egg custard! So yummy.

My mom was a different kind of grandmother. She played on the floor (and in the pool). She went to a Water Park with us when she was in her late 70’s and rode all the rides with my kids. Even the “Bubba Tub”! She baked cookies, yes. But she also played Uno and Scrabble and Hide & Seek. She made Gingerbread Houses with the girls at Christmas and she and my dad took the older grandchildren camping with them in their RV. She mailed the Kids’ Page from her local newspaper to our girls so that they could do the games and puzzles and think of her. About a week before she died, she went with me to take the prom pictures of our younger daughter and her friends. She was amazed at the Paparazzi that appeared for the event (or was it the Mamarazzi?). She traveled, and she had fun.

Neither was better; just different due to their times and lifestyle. I just discovered, when writing this blog, that my Grandmother was about the same age when I was ten as my mother was when my older daughter was ten. So much had changed for women in those years!

I wonder what kind of grandmother I will be when it’s my turn? I’m sure it’ll be fun!

Until next time,