Nanna | Cider in the Sun

I’ve been sitting here starring at that blinking curser for god knows how long. The thing is, it’s not writers block, and it’s not for lack of knowing what I want to write about, Its more the fact, how do I put words down to paper to express exactly what I want to write. How do I explain how it feels when someone you know and someone you love has basically lost their mind and become a shell of their former person. How does one ever understand or cope with or reason with – Alzheimer’s .

I don’t think I ever could put it into words, so best not I even try.. so instead what I would like to share is this:

My Nanna lives in England, and obviously, I and my family live here in Australia. It’s because of this reason I have loved Christmas and big occasions oh so much. At Christmas time and some Easters and some birthdays, my Nanna came to visit us. My Aunt and Uncle also make the Christmas trip over from whatever country they are in at the time. We would have a massive “proper” Christmas lunch (the only way I know with turkey and pork and ham and lots of roasted veggies and of course my Mums famous TRIFLE *drool*) and then all play cricket and swim in the pool all afternoon. Of course this is Melbourne weather depending!

This was and is my favourite time of the year, ask anyone I know. We all sang together while putting the trimmings on the tree and all famously sat around in a circle while I ceremoniously handed out the gifts..etc etc.

But of course, there was always a time when my Nanna and other family members had to leave, and I would be devastated, especially as a child. Back then, England was universes away, literally impossible to comprehend as a 5/6/7/8 year old.

My brother and I would always write my Nanna a goodbye card, and birthday / Easter card. My mum being the craft teacher/guru she is, must have instilled this trait in us, cards, letters, drawings. You name it, we did it and a lot of the time sent them on to our Nanna along with photos and even sometimes some scratch and sniffs ha ha ha (remember those!)

These cards and letters and the like, I haven’t thought of in a long time… until now.

My mum sent a giant box of things over from my Nanna’s house in England this week, a box full of a lifetime of memories and apparently it’s nothing compared to what my mum and aunt have found.

Turns out, every one of those letters, every one of those photos and every single one of those cards we have sent my Nanna, you guessed it, she has them still. She has kept the most amazing things from our childhood and also my mum’s childhood. She had them all in her bedroom, stored away nicely. I guess to go through on a rainy day and to reminisce about another time.

My mum has sent me a few things, things she thought I would like to see again and things my Nanna won’t be able to comprehend again.

She has even got, and this one made my eyes well up like no mans business, the letter my dad wrote after my brother was born in 1982, expanding on their brief phone call they had (which back then for international would of cost an arm and a leg) telling her about the tests they had done on him as a new born and how he passed with flying colours and how he “the baby is beautiful”. She had that, in her box of goodies, and it made my heart cry out in joy and sink in sorrow within the same breath.

Its amazing that we get to see these things again, but its heart breaking at the same time.

Sometimes it’s hard to think about someone getting old, someone losing their memory, someone losing their former spirit, Alzheimer’s. But, I am grateful my Nanna is still here. She is living and loving and laughing and although her memory and a few other cognitive processes may be failing, I know she is in there somewhere, the feisty stubborn, big hearted, only ever a skirt wearing woman that we’ve always known and loved….

These are just two of the things I found in the box of never ending, heart warming, treasures.

I would take a guess of the ages I was when I did them, the first I would have been about 7/8 and the second one I would hazard a guess at about 12/11. Don’t worry, I know how to spell AWESOME now!