Granny Grace

Well Grandpa Joe caused a lot of interest yesterday, so it's only fair that you should meet his glamorous partner - Granny Grace - she whom he espied selling poppies in St Brelades, Jersey - asked to take out walking but was refused as she had her poppies to sell. He brought the whole lot and married her within the week.

Granny Grace was an extrovert and very complex character - a very strong and often domineering woman but with a huge sense of fun. Highly glamorous, she was never to be seen without lacy collars and velvet bits and pieces. As she grew older she slept in full makeup, just in case she should die in the night and would want to be found looking her best. She loved to dance and throw parties and had been known to dance on top of tables.  Himself and I were invited out to Malta, where they retired, for  a second honeymoon. Himself has never fully recovered for 'having fun' was high on the agenda and himself is quite resistant to  organised and compulsory fun, especially if it involves dancing - which it did.

She was an outrageous flirt, but very innocent. She gave fantastic parties and once lived in a flat in what had once been Diana Dors' house - Granny had the ballroom and I can remember twirling around in her pink and mauve net underskirts! After grandpa's death she had strings of men  forever proposing- they were kept mercilessly dangling and she never married again. She belonged to a different generation and was horrified by the thought of feminism though she was of course inadverdently championing  women's rights-  she couldnt imagine why I would want to go to uni as I would only get married; and I remember watching with some interest and trepidation as she browsed a copy of my Cosmo magazine - her verdict at the end ' well, we  never had spasms in my day!!!' Probably the best advice she gave me was 'never trust a man in plimsolls!!'

Grandpa was quite the opposite of all this but they seemed to have come to an amicable and agreeable arrangement. Upon his death, she remained in Malta. She continued to lead an energetic and useful life, helping all sorts of causes and throwing yet more parties. She smoked pink and mauve sobrani cigarettes and kept pink and mauve sugared almonds in silver bonbon dishes - pink and mauve figured highly in her decor.  She always carried smelling salts in her handbag  and they were adminstered  freely. When my brother got stuck in the revolving door of Swan and Edgar's, no one noticed him because Granny was having  a fit of the vapours. Her handwriting was incredibly flambuoyant and totally illegible.  She lived until she was 92  - still formidable, still fun, still exasperating, still outrageous. Some people seem to think I take after her - I think it's just the handwriting and possibly the nose.
Her themes tune had to be this:  I could have danced all night