Happy Birthday Gran

Today is my Grans birthday and if she were here she would be 102 years old! Her name was Margaret Jane and I have her middle name, as does my daughter Laura and I am secretly hoping that Laura will carry on the tradition.

My Gran was born in 1909 in Longford, Coventry and had a hard life. Widowed young with three children, Gran worked as a post lady from a small post office in Longford. My mum can remember going with her during school holidays and helping sort the post, then onto her round until lunchtime.

Gran had a lovely garden and grew her own veg and as a child I can remember her home in St Giles Road, Ash Green. Her lovely old home, etched in my memory, was simply furnished with useful furniture, no washing machine just a sink and mangle, no fridge just stone floored pantry, brightly coloured linoleum floor and open fire. I used to toast crusty bread on a bent wire toasting fork over that fire, whilst sifting through an old silver teapot that Gran collected bits in (buttons, badges, old coins and trinkets picked from the road) me – a magpie for old nick nacks even then.

Gran was a proud woman, who asked for nothing and gave so much. She never married again, but raised my Uncle Reg,  sadly no longer with us, my lovely Uncle Dave and my fabulous mum without any social security as there was no such thing in those days. You lived simply, made your own, mended and mum can remember them picking up coal dropped in the road from the cart and taking it home to keep warm with. Any why not?

(Gran, My Uncle Dave, My Mum)

Gran rode her bike everywhere, and in her later years she used it to ride up to Wheelwright Lane school where she became the after school cleaner. My mum was the cook and my gran the cleaner and gran occasionally helped out on the school crossing. Gran rode her bike until 1980 and as her eyesight failed she gave it up, eventually moving into Bedworth into the Grove sheltered housing. I wonder what she’d make of the town now?  Sadly Gran left us when my children were young so they don’t have too many of their own memories, so I pass on my own.

 Happy Birthday Gran

xxxx