LOST—A GRANDMOTHER

Evening Star, Issue 25849, 20 July 1946, Page 10

LOST—A GRANDMOTHER

[Written by Mart Scott for the f ' Evening Star.'] J Where are the grandmothers of I yester-year ? I have often pondered the question as I watched the slim, elegant, lip-sticked women of 50-odd l who say, casually, " My daughter has a small son, you know; Peter (or perhaps Christopher) is a fine little chap. We're great pals." Admittedly, these are grandmothers, generically speaking, but they are most ungrandmotherly in I appearance, in language, and certainly in figure. It all makes me shake my head and say that grandmothers are not what they were in my young days; and, once one has permitted oneself to use that expression, one has admitted defeat and become, once and for all, well and truly " dated.'' , Not that I was ever the happy possessor of a grandmother—and this was a cause of great regret to me all my childhood years. I cherished a deep and secret jealousy of other children, who prattled of what granny did lor them, what she said in their defence, (and what she gave them,* making it j clear' in every word not merely that j their mother or father had a mother still living, but that they possessed a real grandmother, possessed her body and soul. My best friend was peculiarly haippy in her choice of grandmothers. 1 remember the old lndy with the j warmest affection. She was whitehaired and very charming, and.wore always in the afternoons tlie daintiest of lace caps and the finest of Shetland shawls. She was cultured and witty, but, for all that, quite frankly.obsessed with her grandchild, -and .entirely unrepentant when accused of spoiling her. "My dear," I remember hearing her retort to her daughter, " 1 brought you up-very welljkand did not overindulge you'. Now T. propose to enjoy my grandchild, not to discipline her " —and enjoy her she.did. At'..first 1 admired her from. afar, off, but, since she had in her a great deal ofthe universal mother, she presently recognised a certain wistfulhess in my watching, and drew me into the circle of her warm and loving charm. Presently 1 was " adopted," and, until her death —which came far too soon, thereby cutting short an Indian summer of infinite beauty—l had the privilege of calling her " granny," and the joy of pretending, in my secret heart, that she really did belong to. me, 1 found that I could talk to her, could confide in her and trust her as I never could dream of doing with my own contemporaries, not even with the generation immediately ahead of my own. " But that is natural," she told me gaily; "I am at the end of the road, you at its beginning, and the two extremes can meet very happily." And so I carried to her many of the joys and sorrows and secret aspirations of my early childhood, ran to her arms for encouragement, and sat on her lap for comfort. Sat on her lap. Where are the laps to-day? The modern grandmother does not possess a lap, at least not the kind upon which a child could sit with any sense of comfort or of security. She has knees, certainly—silkclad and often in evidence—but thev do not inspire the same confidence as' a comfortable and cushiony lap. Those children who are " splendid pals " with their grandmothers would <not dream of snuggling into their laps to whisper terrifying tales of bad dreams and bogies ihat come by. night. They can possibly talk over their problems as man to man; but it isn't a cosy affair associated with arm-chairs, firelight, comforting murmurs—and laps. Do not let me appear to disparage the modern grandmother. I admire her courage, her wit, her indomitable mastery of the years; the modern child has gained much in friendship with her; but it has lost a consoling refuge, an unfailing champion, a sympathetic retreat. I note with interest that the children of to-day take their grandmothers very .easily; the word " granny " is almost unknown; most of them call their.»grandmothers by their Christian names and many of them use nicknames. One family 1 know calls its father's attractive mother "Binkie;" another styles its grandmother "Toots;" and yet another, I regret to say, refers to a tall and slender lady as " Piglet." They are thoroughly matev, practically of an age. Nor is the modern grandmother's task a sinecure. During the war 1 used often to think that she was the most hard-worked member of the community. Her son-in-law was away fighting; her daughter . was in the Wrens or the Waacs or a factory ; and grandmother—well, she was busy being a grandmother, looking after the baby, taking the four-year-old to kindergarten, running the house, doing the shopping, and, in the evening, going to patriotic bridge parties or Red Cross classes. Certainly they did their part most nobly and most unselfishly in the years of crisis. Probably they did it more efficiently than would my grandmother of fond and sentimental memories. I doubt if she would really have proved quite so efficient. Women had not worked so hard in her youth, and in her fifties she had become rather an observer and a kindly critic of life than an actor. She listened, she sympathised, she advised, but she did not expect to have to go down into the arena and join in the struggle. She had done with all that. At the age of 50 or so she was content to be an onlooker; she had borne her familv and seen them safelylaunched ; lier worjk was done_ and she thereupon assumed a becoming cap, wore silk dresses that rustled, and lacey shawls, and sat back to enjoy the spectacle of life. I fancy that she might not have made a very good war worker; that she might not have /been a really capable manager, and would certainly not have mastered the art of queueing up for rations. , But How delightful she was! Her unrouged face was frankly lined, but they were lines of love and laughter and wisdom; her hair was undeniably silver, entirely unpenned, but very smooth and soft; her little caps were most unpractical, but how becoming, and even coquettish! In her attitude towards life she was gently detached; she took no sides, and preached no sermons ; but she was always gentle and consoling and stood firm by what she used to call " moral principles." Ah, well, she had her day and that day is gone. The old order has changed lest one good grandmother might spoil the modern child. The youth of to-day is very fond of its Binkie and great pals with its Piglet; but it will never know what it has missed—nor how comfortable a thing a lap can ,be.