Grand Dads

[abu nuwas]

My father was born in 1887. He married in 1910, and had three children, but sadly, while he survived the Great War, his first wife did not. For many years, he raised the children, aided but various Grannies, who must have had a tough time following his zealous conversion to Catholicism. Then, in 1934, he met and married my mother, at age forty-seven. They had four children to-gether, of whom I was the last. He was fifty-four when I was born. So my half-siblings, whom I first recall in uniform when I was tiny, in yet another war, were of an age where they might have been my parents. Probably would have been better had my father been younger, I would have known him longer adullt to adult, but things were as they were. If anyone has the enthusiasm and strong constitution, why not? But for me -- happy with grand-children-- and I like the idea of being 'grand' anything! It has, for us, provided an amazing link to the past: my father was 14 when Queen Victoria died, and for my brother's children, especially, it is almost unbelievable. He had children late, and his boys are now twenty and twenty three, and can talk of their grand-father being born all those years ago -- more interestingly, because my brother has an astonishing memory, and is a great raconteur, so they will have absorbed and pass on a lot from that era.

This passing on business must be important to humans, and in countries where people die young, as in much of Africa, one wonders how this happens. Pheweeeeee!