Precious Memories Part 2
I’ve been remembering a few more things about my Granny – when I was at university she was my most faithful letter-writer. I think she wrote me a letter every couple of weeks, I must dig them out some day. She would always stick a few stamps into the envelope for me because she knew students weren’t exactly flush and that was just her wee contribution. When I was a kid and my parents were away, I sometimes stayed over at my Granny’s with her & my aunt. Mornings were hilarious, Granny would always be wandering into my bedroom with a wet facecloth threatening to give me a refreshing wake-up call! And one of our favourite games at Granny’s in those days was Boggle – the one where you mix up all the letters then you have 1 minute to make up as many words as possible. Aye, my Granny was always up for a bit of craic! It's strange now that she's not here anymore, even though I didn't see her as much over the last year or so because she was in a nursing home and just not always completely 'with it', she was still very much part of life - everytime I spoke to my Mum on the phone I would always be asking how Granny was. So there's a bit of a void now. And I'm sure my parents and two aunts feel it even more especially when they were so involved in caring for her.

At Granny’s funeral the minister gave a recount of her life and it was amazing just how full her life was, I hadn’t realised she’d been involved in so many organisations along with my Grandad when they were younger – the local ploughing society, Ulster Farmers’ Union, Young Farmers etc. And it’s amazing to think that she was 7 years old when the First World War started, she lived through so many changes and significant times in history and had plenty of stories and recollections to tell. It’s just made me appreciate more that the lives we’re given are precious not least because of the stories we’re given to tell. When the tsunami struck on Boxing Day ’04 – and I think I blogged about this at the time – entire villages and communities were wiped out. And with them many stories and memories were instantly wiped out too... Precious things indeed.