I always wanted to be a grandmother, but was almost resigned to the fact that it was not going to happen for me.
My mother found that being a grandmother was a significant pleasure and she came to my rescue when I had a small baby and was trying to run a restaurant, not once but twice!
My memories of my own grandmother are few; she died when I was about eight. My paternal grandmother had died some years earlier in the UK and I have almost no memory of her. The strongest memory I have of her is when she bribed me to go to Sunday school with the offer of making me a new dress. In my memory she was fierce, but I now know that she was nursing her husband, who had Alzheimer’s, and that she had very high blood pressure herself (which ultimately killed her).
I have two daughters and neither of them partnered during their twenties or thirties.
The experiences of other friends showed me that being a grandmother seemed hugely enjoyable. I observed with particular delight the development of one friend’s three grandchildren, who shared part of my summer holidays over a fifteen-year period. Their growing-up happened so fast. One year we had a baby, a toddler and a preschooler, then, in the blink of an eye, we had bird-watching and boogie boards. Another blink, and we had adolescence, breaking voices and curves.
But nothing was happening on that front in my family. And then my elder daughter met a delightful man. He had been married previously and already had grown-up children. They were undecided about whether to try for their own child, and by the time they agreed to give IVF a go, she was over forty and it just didn’t happen. On the sidelines, my heart broke for her and there was little meaningful comfort I could offer. But I know they eventually made peace with the situation and moved on.
A few years passed and then my younger daughter, still without a life partner, announced that she intended to go it alone. Both my elder daughter and I became fully engaged in the whole process, from the earliest talks at Melbourne IVF to the successful birthing of my adorable granddaughter. Elder daughter was the birth partner for her sister—a wonderful decision that set in place a deep connection between the two girls, as well as with the newest girl in the family.
I arrived at the delivery suite half an hour after the birth. My elder daughter was in a bathing costume, having helped her sister shower during contractions. There was a lot of water everywhere, a lot of laughter and, best of all, a beautiful bright-eyed little girl nestled in her mother’s arms, a proud aunty along-side. To this day, that love has only deepened and my granddaughter just adores her aunty. I know it might sound like a cliché, but I still believe birth is a miracle.
Mother and baby came to stay with me for the first few weeks. As the new mother learned how to cope with breastfeeding and sleep deprivation, my role was to make lots of food, have lots of baby cuddles, do whatever I could to maximise sleep time for mother. But most of all, I marvelled at the existence of this small, perfect person. I felt such joy and awe as I gazed on her flawless face, the silkiness of her cheeks, the sweep of her eyelashes that trembled with a tear, the tiny fingers and toes, and then there was the clutch of her finger, the sigh of contentment as she settled into her basket.
Somehow the passing of time has changed since my own daughters were babies. With my grandchild, I have been amazed at the speed of her development and wanted to hang on to those early months to better remember them. We are now nearly four years into the life of this precious child and she delights me anew on every occasion. Being with her has been pure pleasure.
I miss photograph albums. I own a treasured but very battered album with old sepia and black-and-white photos recording the early days of my parents’ courtship, their subsequent travels, my babyhood and that of my siblings, as well as many highlights of our later years. The album ends with lovely images of my own children as babies, all taken well before the digital revolution. I have pored over these photos hundreds of times: just a glimpse of Mum and Dad walking among the cherry blossom in Japan, or of my eldest daughter with her father, stirs rich memories and profound emotions.
Like everyone, I have hundreds of images on my phone and have printed and framed several of them, but scrolling through my digital file of photos doesn’t stir the same emotions. It does, however, remind me yet again how fast time has flown in the life of my granddaughter: I had forgotten that day she wore my sunglasses, or when she was on the swing in the park for the first time, or when she helped me mix a birthday cake. Others probably handle their digital files more cleverly, but mine are so jumbled that they frustrate me when I search to locate a specific photo to illustrate a point or a place or a moment in time.
An important part of the pleasure for all of us is the joy with which my elder daughter has embraced being an aunty. There is no trace of resentment or envy, just wholehearted enjoyment of the moment. And she is so good at playing in a really focused way with my granddaughter, who is now right into games of the imagination.
‘Say you are driving the fire truck, Aunty L…’
‘Say you are the captain of the ship, Grandma…’
This little girl can spend a concentrated hour with a box of Duplo, a brilliant hand-me-down from a dear friend whose own child had outgrown it. It is a large collection of pieces, with trucks and cars of all shapes and sizes, an aeroplane, a police car and fire truck, a house complete with wardrobes and drawers to stuff full of treasures. I love playing with her and listening to her create stories of who is doing what in her Duplo world. But when I dare suggest that the character with the grey hair might be me, she says scathingly, ‘No, Grandma, you have white hair…’ So far she hasn’t shown much interest in dolls, although she does have a small felt mouse that she tucks into its cardboard bed.
Being a responsible single mother is a challenge. My daughter has firm ideas about child-rearing, and happily, it seems to me, most are based on common sense. She understands that her child must be able to separate from her without anxiety, so that daycare is enjoyable, not a torment, and so that she can go about earning a living and have a social life. In this she has succeeded admirably. On the occasions that I have collected my granddaughter from daycare, she is always happy to see me, if a bit reluctant to leave whatever game she is engaged in.
My daughter also insists that her daughter explain herself rather than have tantrums. I often hear: ‘Use your words to tell me…’ Her child is allowed to try and fail if necessary: ‘I can do it myself…’—whether she is dipping fingers of toast into a soft-boiled egg in an eggcup, pulling up her underpants or climbing onto a stool to watch me at the kitchen bench. Of course, I sometimes hover with concern. Can she really climb up onto that stool? Can she really serve herself a helping of mashed sweet potato without tipping it all over herself and the table? The answer, of course, is that she can—but hey, what does it matter if a blob of sweet potato ends up on the floor?
Her curiosity is amazing, as is her excitement at seeing something new. ‘I saw Mother Earth,’ she told me after her first plane ride. Her mother has always enjoyed a new experience and a few facts, and I am delighted that she takes her daughter to places like the Melbourne Museum, Scienceworks, exhibitions at the National Gallery of Victoria, the zoo and so on. Their weekends are crammed with activities.
The only downside is that my daughter’s house is on the other side of the city, where most of her close friends live. It is quite an excursion for her to visit me, so I get to see my granddaughter mostly for sleepovers or at family lunches and dinners. Unlike some grandparents, I have never had any desire to be a babysitter and take on one or more days a week to totally devote myself to my grandchild. I am too busy myself for this to happen, but we do all share a holiday once or twice a year; at these times I am entranced with my granddaughter’s developing vocabulary and understanding of quite abstract concepts. During our recent holiday in Queensland, she tried to explain gravity to me.
With my well-known engagement in all things culinary, I have been especially interested in my granddaughter’s food life. I have had to acknowledge (having forgotten that her own mother went through a stage of almost only eating toast with peanut butter, and later had a fixation with lamb cutlets) that young children quickly learn that food is a wonderful power game. Today she may love carrots, but tomorrow will refuse to touch them. She will weep with frustration if I fail to remember that she likes her dinner served in several bowls, so she can help herself: pasta in one bowl, grated cheese in another and the broccoli on a separate plate. Silly of me to forget this, as my own strong preference is to serve dishes to the centre of the table, rather than dole out individual dollops.
She often eats dinner on her own, as bedtime is still quite early for her, but at family lunches we are all at the table together and she is offered the same selection as everyone else. Currently, her favourites are salmon, ocean trout, pasta and savoury homemade meatballs. She enjoys most vegetables and crunchy salad items, although her willingness to try new food seems to change in a random way. Her favourite snacks are crackers and cheese and apple and cheese. For dessert, she likes rhubarb and yoghurt or blueberries and yoghurt. As the child of a modern and informed mother, her intake of sugar and salt is carefully controlled. But that does not prevent a bit of birthday cake or a small serve of ice-cream. Whenever she is at my place, she has her own ‘cino’, which is really just steamed milk. I love the fact that she is appreciative of food and that her treats are greeted with big smiles.
When I had small children to influence or entertain, we did not have a plethora of screens to contend with. This little person can guide me around a smartphone with ease. ‘No, Grandma, you should press pause,’ or ‘It’s on the ABC Kids app, Grandma…’ She listens to stories on her smartphone after lights out: Winnie-the-Pooh, Paddington, Snugglepot and Cuddlepie and others I haven’t heard of. She is allowed to watch Play School and Bluey fairly regularly.
She shows no interest in the Wiggles, but her all-time favourite, I am a bit worried to admit, is the Disney story Moana. Her favourite outfit is a twirly skirt, like Moana’s. And she likes to impart bits of Moana’s philosophy to me. Moana is a strong female character committed to the cause of saving her community, and my granddaughter goes to great lengths to explain her heroine’s battles against the forces trying to sabotage her. I confess that I have had to watch the movie myself to get the context, and I’ve even googled some of the references, which seem more than far-fetched to me.
But books are still her favourite, which of course delights me and her mother, as we are all book lovers. I think she would be happiest if someone read stories to her for hours on end. I gave her Milly-Molly-Mandy, which I remembered fondly; I have to say that I now find the stories too long and very tedious. But she seems to enjoy them. I have also tried The Complete Adventures of Snugglepot and Cuddlepie, which did not retain her interest as much as the audiobook version. More successful has been Tim Winton’s Into the Deep, about a young girl who is frightened of deep water. I am sure I read this story to her with conviction, as I am frightened of deep water myself. My granddaughter is just starting to feel relaxed on a beach, so she listens very closely. At my apartment I keep a bookshelf well stocked with books for her and at home she has many more.
One of the results of being a later-in-life grandmother is that there are lots of things I can’t do with her. I cannot run with her in the park or throw and catch balls. I cannot comfortably push her in a stroller up the steep path to my apartment. I can no longer lift her with ease into and out of the bathtub, although I can sit on the stool beside it and help play games with her bath toys. My companionship is pretty well confined to listening to her with full attention, reading stories, joining in games of the imagination, walking to the park to watch her on the swings and—very soon, I hope—helping her learn to cook with pleasure.
I would love to help her make some muffins and scones, grate cheese for gozleme. And I would love her to help me make an apple or a berry tart, or dips with yoghurt and herbs. I could show her how to roll a bit of fresh egg pasta, or dough for a focaccia. If she is interested, we could have many happy times together in the kitchen for years to come.
But I resist considering her future. I know I will probably not be there for her eighteenth birthday, or her other major life milestones. This is too sad to dwell on.
I do speculate as to what sort of future we are developing here in Melbourne, Australia, for a bright and curious young woman who is not wealthy. Will the enormous and disgraceful inequities in our education system still exist, where one school has overwhelmingly grand facilities and another has draughty, inadequate classrooms? Will our cities still be as congested? Will the major transport projects presently under construction cope with the expected population growth? Will the car still be given primacy in all planning? Will people have significantly reduced the waste they produce? Will we still have physical books to read and parks to play in? Will we give more of a helping hand to single parents so they can choose how to manage their time between parenting and other work? Will we help to foster an even more diverse Australia? And will Indigenous Australians have the same opportunities as my granddaughter? Will the health and education authorities have finally agreed to introduce a positive program of pleasurable food education into every school to help all children make good food choices? As I write this in 2019, more than 2000 schools and early-learning centres all round Australia have joined the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden movement. But there are still many thousands of children who have not yet had the chance to understand how life-changing this program can be.
My granddaughter understands that she has a donor, not a daddy, and so far seems to take this in her stride. She sometimes casually mentions her ‘brothers’ to me—there are at least four other half-siblings—‘diblings’ is the correct term for donor siblings, I’ve been told—all boys. The donor seems to have a relaxed and interested attitude towards all of these young children. He invites the mothers and children to gatherings once or twice a year, which I found startling when I first heard about it. Now, I just see it as another piece of a brave new world that I can admire, if not fully understand.
My granddaughter has brought me closer to both of my daughters, especially when we share her special moments. My daughters have understood so many of the things that parents have to contend with as we guide and help our cherished children grow and learn. This child looks so much like her mother that she has reminded me of long-ago happy holidays with both of my girls. She has also helped her aunty relax and know that she is loved and valued wholeheartedly. And she has helped me to reflect on the early years of both my daughters: on how quickly one forgets and on how precious those years are.
I have experienced incredible joy and spent many happy hours with my granddaughter. I so want her to live a fulfilling life, have realistic expectations and great friendships, and to remember our time together with love.