Relations I’ve neglected 1. Whereas Grandpa S once lashed me (for being clumsy) with a cane kept handily on the living-room picture rail, Grandpa R was more tranquil. Not surprising, since Grandpa R was a retired Baptist minister and wore his dog collar to the grave.
I must confess Grandpa R didn’t interest me very much. Perhaps I reckoned he was simply too old. If this seems callow I’m willing to be considered too old by anyone who feels that way inclined. Living through the Hitler War suggests I’m past my sell-by date.
Remarkably, Grandpa R had a club foot. I saw it bare, once, and it made me feel queasy. But then I was no milk-of-human-kindness grandson. He also wore a grey Homburg.
He was stone deaf (as was Grannie R) and I fear he got left out of things. His figure was skeletal and his fingers were of a length one might have expected of, say, Chopin. He would occasionally raise his hands and contemplate them. One of the family (Not I.) said he was telling himself: never done a day’s labour in my life. As no doubt you have deduced, we were that kind of family.
On a hidden agenda I asked him what was his “favourite book”. Not what you might have expected, he said “Burns.” Adding “The Scottish poet.” I released my sucker-punch: “What about The Bible?” He dismissively waved one of his elegant hands. “Different,” he explained
He continued to wear his ministerial black and was knocked down at night by what must have been a fairly rare car. I returned home to find the car driver, visibly sweating, sitting at our table. Elsewhere was Grandpa’s leather-bound crutch, also black, now broken. It seemed to say everything.
I remember him in less detail, me being four years younger. He used to walk me to the park about a quarter of a mile away. We called it The Rec., short for recreation ground. There was an old hut, maybe it was a disused single decker bus where retired local chaps congregated. I'm not sure what I did when we arrived there but it was swirling with pipe tobacco smoke. Grandma R. told us that his parishioners complained about Grandpa's excessive pipe smoking. and her defence for him was "well, he only smokes an ounce" cleverly avoiding to specify over what time period. I also recall that G's favourite song was Harry Lauder singing "Keep Right On To The End of The Road."
ReplyDeleteSir Hugh: One might also have reflected on what Grandpa R did when he got to the converted single-decker. He was, to some extent, a cultured man as his substantial library (mainly theological works) at Wesley Grove suggested. The other men were working class and on the one occasion I entered the bus (My chronic bronchitis prevented any subsequent visit to its smoky atmosphere) they gently joshed him. He was, of course, what he would have called A Man of God but I always thought his religious beliefs had become somewhat less profound in retirement.
ReplyDeleteOne interesting aspect of his Noncomformist background (which would surely have discouraged liquor) became apparent on the occasion when he stayed with us at Gordon Terrace while Grannie R was in hospital. Mum had difficulty getting him to eat but when he was presented with a glass of whisky that went down in one gulp.
Something I learnt, after his death, had to do with Baptist practice. Baptism involved total immersion and a special tiled recess was opened up in the church for this, and filled with water. Crowds used to gather because the club foot meant Grandpa R was far from steady on his pins and these gawpers seemed to think that some day a baptism might turn into a drowning. But who told me this? Perhaps Uncle Ken, or possibly Johann.
The stuff about smoking is quite new to me. The Lauder song I knew about but had forgotten.
Next in this series - the much more challenging figure of Harry, Mum's brother.