Not Dead Yet !: keep in touch

I met my Granma when I was ten years old. I met her again when I was eighteen. Granma was my father's mother. She is the only one of my four grandparents that I have ever met. I hope that she liked me.

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Those first few sentences have been waiting for a month. It's important to me. I know why it's important, I'm just not sure if I can explain it.

This morning I add, I hope that she liked me. It seems to be a minor revelation: that is the reason why this post is important. To me.

I'll keep typing. See if it all makes sense. That's why posting to this blog is important for me: putting my thoughts into words helps me to understand myself. And then I can stop worrying about myself... :-)

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I met Granma when I was ten years old. We -- my mother, my sister and I -- stayed with Granma. For days? weeks? I have no idea. I had an upstairs bedroom. I remember waking one morning to look outside and see that the world was covered with a thin blanket of snow. It was beautiful.

Granma lived in England, somewhere to the south. I was born in Australia. This was my first visit to England.

I next met Granma when I was eighteen. Granma was now either divorced or widowed, I have no idea which. She had remarried and now lived with Uncle Louis in the north of England. I stayed with them for... probably just a few days.

I remember that tea-bags were a new invention. Granma and Uncle Louis had opened one up, didn't quite trust them, It's just fluff inside, they said. I remember that Uncle Louis drove us to a nearby town one day. He pointed out his favourite hillside, a mass of glorious Autumn colours. It was beautiful.

I never met either of them again.

Perhaps ten years later, Uncle Louis had died. Granma had followed her children to Australia. Where she died.

At the time, I was sad. At most I thought, It would have been nice to have met up with Granma in Australia. Yet I had hardly known Granma. I carried on with my own life.

Another ten years on. I began to realise: if you do like someone -- it is worth making the effort to keep in touch.

I did like Granma. She sent Christmas parcels of toys each year when I was growing up. (There may have been more than toys, I remember the toys:-) I don't remember writing letters, I may have. I did go out of my way to visit, when I was eighteen.

All this is about what I would expect of a young person growing up. An awareness that a relation exists, a willingness to occasionally visit. The generation in between keeps in touch.

This morning I realise: I hope that Granma liked me. Not for myself but for Granma. I would like to think that she enjoyed my two visits. That she was pleased with the son of her son. We -- each generation -- lead our own lives. But I hope that Granma liked the near-stranger that she met only twice.

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When Granma died I thought, It would have been nice to meet up with her again, in Australia. Years later I thought, I didn't do much to keep in touch with Granma. No, it's not guilt. Just a touch of ... sadness? disappointment?

I liked Granma. It would have been nice to have met her again -- or written letters -- just to keep in touch. (Maybe! To be honest, we can be a difficult family...)

More years passed and I realise: If you like someone, it is worth the effort to keep in touch. I'm not much good at writing letters -- real letters, snailmail, that is. Email... though... is, for some reason, so much easier.

I began with an annual Christmas Letter. Just a once-yearly effort to keep in touch. Deb said that it was a waste of time, that no-one wants to know what we have been up to. Until her friend commented that it was nice to get our Christmas Letter...

With the magic of email, it's even easier. It's only a handful of people, friends and family. An occasional email, not too often. The very occasional meeting, even... Just keeping in touch.

A small pleasure. Well worth the small effort.

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Some people just drop out of sight. Fall out of touch. I wonder how they are. Keeping in touch... just does not happen.

Sometimes we simply ... drift too far apart. We have little in common, keep in touch because it is a pleasure to exchange news, then accept that we are strangers who once crossed paths.

Sometimes we ... follow different paths. We share a lot, exchange news when we can, but follow different paths. We would enjoy meeting... but spend more time on other things. Our lives are too full of differences to allow time to catch up on shared interests.

Which brings me -- I think -- to the point of this post. The reason why I want to write it. The reason why it has taken me so long to write it.

When Granma died I thought, it would have been nice to have met up with her again. In Australia. But she was dead. Too late to meet again.

People get out of touch. That's okay, lives diverge.

Now it's my turn to be dying. There are people who I have not met -- not contacted -- for years. We have drifted apart... or moved apart. Do I want to catch up with them? Do I want "a last chance" to catch up -- before I die?

Well... yes and no.

There are some people I would like to catch up with, to see how they are going. To satisfy myself -- in some cases -- that they are well, that their lives are good :-) Or perhaps to look at them and think, My goodness how they have aged! Or just to talk over old times, the pleasures of memories of the past.

Do I want to catch up with people because, I'm dying, this could be the last chance to catch up? No... Definitely not.

If we have drifted apart then we have drifted apart. If there was no reason to communicate for the last many years -- there is no more reason now. If there has been no common ground -- no interest in just keeping in touch -- then I see no reason for a final farewell.

What I do see is the "lesson" that I learnt... slowly... in the decade or more after Granma died:

If I want to keep in touch, do it. Keep in touch while there is no end to the future. Keep in touch because it's a pleasure. Keep in touch because there is pleasure in discussing the present and the future.

If I didn't keep in touch while life stretched out beyond the visible horizon -- I can't see much point in keeping in touch now that the horizon is so much closer.

That's just my point of view :-) It may be different for people who still plan to live forever. In which case: get in touch!

Perhaps, though, for your other friends and family: just *keep* in touch.