Mabel Willows

Simon's Grandma died last week. Her name was Mabel and she was ninety-eight.

In her lifetime Mabel witnessed the invention of the telephone, four Monarchs, two World Wars and twenty-three British Prime Ministers who were all apparently as bad as each other, but not anywhere near as terrible as Tony Blair. No, for Tony Blair Mabel harbored a special kind of contempt, the kind usually reserved for the likes of tax-men, ruffians and women with 'untrustworthy hair' (namely Cherie Blair).

Birthdays seemed to provide the perfect opportunity for a spot of Blair-Bashing. I'm sure all of Mabel's children, grand-children and their respective partners received the same response upon thanking her for birthday monies: "That's alright dear, but you know, I would have given you a lot more if that Tony Blair wasn't STEALING MY MONEY!"

Depending upon how vitriolic she was feeling, her rants sometimes extended into: "I mean, if Tony Blair really did care about me, you know, like he says he does, then he'd get right down here and put a cash point in my house! How does he think I'm going to get to the bank with my hip?" Fair point, I'm sure you'll agree. Bad, bad Tony.

One of the most hilarious things I remember about Mabel is the fact that she smoked, but maintained that for the life of her she'd never ever even seen one of those dastardly cigarette things, let alone puffed on one or two hundred of them in her very own living room. Lord no. Mabel did not smoke. Apart from in the old home videos where she was caught, irrefutably, having a crafty fag next to the car, in the garden, on the beach, at the dinner table. Admittedly in these instances (when she spotted the camera) she didn't actually smoke whole cigarettes, as they were hurriedly extinguished and tossed aside with disgust like: "Eew. How did that get in my mouth?" So those ones don't really count.

I remember walking into her kitchen once and noticing that most of her body was inside the dinner-plate cupboard, she obviously hadn't heard me enter the room because when I asked her if everything was alright, I literally scared the living cigarette out of her. Instantly realising she had been rumbled having a nifty fag inside the cupboard - where no-one would see/smell/find her - she automatically ejected the offending article from her mouth and rushed to waft away the smoke, and make her rapid excuses.

As this all happened so quickly - what with her being inside a cupboard and all - she bashed her head on the way out, dropped the fag on to a dinner plate and said a rude word. As I helped her up, desperately trying to contain my laughter, she maintained that she was just looking for one of those thingys at the back, and that it was time for tea, and no that's not fag-ash on your plate, dear.

The last time I saw Mabel her eyesight and hearing were failing. Simon and I sat by her hospital bed and watched silently as she fell in and out of sleep. In the moments that she was awake I asked her what she needed, and leaning forward to save her voice she told me that what she really needed was someone to stroke her back, it made her feel much better she said. And so, slowing supping tea from a straw she sat in her frilly nightie while I stroked her back for the best part of an hour. Even though my arm ached after a while I didn't mind, because in that bed sat Simon's lovely Nanny. Frail now and smaller than I remembered, but definitely Mabel.

She woke suddenly from her mini-nap and smiled at me when I asked her if her back felt any better "Yes dear, you're very kind" she said as she patted my hand. In the same breath she turned to Simon, pointed in my direction and said: "Who's she?"