Grandfathered

by Ian Haysom

  Organized religion is going through a terrible time right now. When I go back to England, it’s sad to see the majestic churches almost empty. Some have been deconsecrated and turned into homes or restaurants. Vicars now have to look after multiple churches and congregations.

  Mayana’s paternal grandparents are Sikh. My wife and I were brought up in the Church of England, but again, we’re not into organized religion. We attended the United Church in Canada when our kids were in Sunday school, and later the Unitarian Church, which didn’t seem to have one God, but accepted many. It was a place where we met many like-minded people, some of whom are still our friends. Once, at an anniversary dinner for our church, the crowd was asked, “Are there any draft dodgers here?”

  About ten people stood up.

  “And did anyone house a draft dodger?”

  Just about everyone over the age of fifty stood up.

  So my grandkids don’t know how to sing “There Is a Green Hill Far Away,” but they’re good kids surrounded by good people and good thoughts. They’re kind and gentle. Most of the time.

  The one thing I should have told Emma, and I will, is that Jesus taught Love. Love your family, your neighbour, the poor, the helpless, the sick, even your enemies. Not exactly the Bible, but not a bad start. She and my other grandkids will have to work out the rest for themselves.

  10. I Need a Pee

  What is it with small children and wanting to go for a pee now? “Now, Grandad! I can’t wait!” I guess they all have tiny bladders, but they have an amazing facility for wanting to pee at the most inopportune moment. Usually in the middle of a traffic jam or in a movie theatre or when I’m up a ladder.

  This past January we were in a Sidney thrift store when Linden beckoned me down and whispered into my ear.

  “I really need to go, Grandad.”

  “Where?”

  “Go pee.” And then he started hopping from foot to foot in that time-honoured tradition of children down the ages. Linden was at this point barely four.

  I picked him up and rushed to the counter, where the two assistants were in deep conversation with a customer. The conversation seemingly involved the entire history of the world or the mysteries of life itself, because there was no way they had noticed me or my grandson.

  “Excuse me,” I said with an air of desperation. “Is there a toilet in here?”

  The assistants looked at each other, looked at me, at my grandson, and one of them, as though calculating his response, said. “No.”

  No?

  “Really?” I asked, finding that hard to believe.

  “Well, not for customers,” said one of them, the younger of the two.

  “It’s for my grandson,” I said pointing at Linden’s angelic face. “He really needs to go. Can he use it?”

  “No,” said the older assistant. “They’re not for customers.”

  There was a standoff for a few seconds. I put my grandson down.

  “Linden,” I said. “There is a toilet here, but you’re not allowed to use it, so you’re just going to have to pee here in the middle of this floor.”

  Linden looked at me with alarm, but not as much alarm as the shop assistants.

  “Look,” the young one sniffed, “there’s a Starbucks just across the street, okay?”

  For the sake of all of us I capitulated and took him there. Thank goodness for non-judgmental coffee shops.

  Once, while I was driving along the M25, the nightmarish motorway that rings London, my granddaughter Emma announced from the back seat that she needed to go pee. Right now.

  “There’s a services area three miles ahead,” I told Jani, who was sitting next to me.

  “Too far,” she said. “We have to stop.”

  So we did, on a hard shoulder, with nary a tree in sight, and Emma did her pee by the side of the car while passing drivers honked. In sympathy? They’d probably had to let their kids and grandkids pee on the motorway too.

  The big new thing, while we’re on the public lavatory issue, is the “nature pee.” This is essentially going for a pee in the woods, by bushes, anywhere that’s in nature. My three grandkids all do nature pees, even when there’s very little nature around. A patch of grass, a tree, a hedge. Anywhere they can find something greenish.

  I look the other way, whistle, act nonchalant. We’ve all gone pee in the woods. Thus far none have needed to water the neighbourhood daffodils (not yet anyway).

  Of course, the need for nature pees at all only means that your leaky little cherub has graduated from diapers. A milestone to be celebrated because for all the convenience of the diaper years there is an obvious distasteful downside. Now I’ve changed my share of diapers over the years. With four kids and three grandkids—and one on the way—I have become something of an expert. A reluctant expert.

  The thing is, I have a terribly weak stomach, and full and smelly diapers will have me heaving. Poop is not a pretty thing, so I have become practised at not actually looking at the contents of the diaper while doing the changing.

  This was somewhat difficult when we used cloth diapers on our first born. I would somehow have to lie my daughter on a change table, or dining-room table—or wherever—lift her legs in the air and try to undo a safety pin, while looking at the ceiling and holding my breath. Then I would try to fold the diaper and its contents into a ball so I wouldn’t have to look at it or inhale. And then I’d prick my finger on the safety pin. I don’t like the sight of blood either, not when it’s my blood.

  I got better when we went onto disposable diapers, though I still often managed to put them on back to front. And then they’d be too baggy and leak, and let me tell you, a leaking diaper is something no grown man should have to see.

  I’m better at it now. I still don’t look or inhale, but I can now change a diaper blindfolded, which, let’s face it, is by far the best way to do it.

  Okay Boomer

  I think my generation is supposed to be offended by the “Okay Boomer” phrase. Depending on your view, it’s either an attack on narrowminded, outdated, condescending attitudes of older people, or an ironic, humourous slap at the generation that believes the world started and ended in the 1960s and no good has come of the world ever since.

  It’s somewhere between the two, I guess. We started the counter-culture thing. And now we’re being laughed at.

  I love it. Young people, particularly late teens and early twentysomethings, are supposed to attack the status quo. They’re supposed to tell the parents and grandparents that we screwed up. And we have screwed up. Many of us have nice homes, but our grandkids will have to live in shoeboxes. We didn’t even know what climate change was—until we did of course. And so on. I could go on and on about what we did wrong, but why bother? Gen X and the Millennials have that covered.

  But I like the Okay Boomer moniker.

  It’s about time my generation was laughed at and ridiculed on TikTok and Instagram and all those other platforms we don’t quite understand but pretend to. The other night, I watched who won the main categories in the Grammys and was somewhat embarrassed—as a former rock critic—to realize that I knew barely any of the names of the performers in the main categories. I recognized many of the songs, but not the people. When I had last looked, Adele and Bruno Mars were huge, as were Taylor Swift and Drake and Ed Sheeran. They’re still big, but all these newer performers came along to mess with my pop culture cred. Here was the Grammy headline on Yahoo the next day:

  Billie Eilish’s Sweep Leaves Li’l Room for Lil Nas X or Lizzo.

  I confess I didn’t know who they were, so had to go look them up and listened to them on YouTube. I kinda liked them. And instantly forgot them.

  So be it. On the radio the other day I heard a DJ complaining that her mother had called Stormzy, the British hip-hop singer, “Onesy.” Actually, that’s not a bad name for a boomer-hip
-hop artist. Onesy. It could be a new thing. Nobody would make fun of that. Right?

  Car Seats

  I have mentioned this already. One of the biggest tests of being a modern grandfather is the kiddie car seat. It is the most baffling piece of engineering ever invented. There are harnesses and clips that defy logic, other straps that don’t pull when they’re supposed to and, worse, you somehow have to locate an anchor for the car seat somewhere between the back seat and the back rest. Your hand always gets stuck when you push it down inside.

  Let’s go back to our own childhoods. When we were kids, we bounced around in cars. We sat in the back of trucks. There was no such thing as a seatbelt. My first-ever ride, being cradled by my mother, was in a motorcycle sidecar. She was probably smoking too. It was a different age.

  When our kids were young, they still bounced around, but we did have car seats for them in the back of our VW Westphalia. Sometimes they used them, often they didn’t. The vehicle was spacious enough inside to play tag, or throw things at each other, which they did regularly.

  And car seats were good places to put the smaller kids when outside the cars—when we had campfires on summer trips or even to strap them into canoes. We have a video of my wife and I paddling with our eldest daughter, Amy—then about ten months old—in Algonquin Park. She was strapped into her car seat and wearing a sun hat. Thank goodness we didn’t tip.

  Nowadays, most parents are religious about baby seats. Every-thing has to be tightened properly, anchored correctly, and facing backwards or forwards depending on age. The weight of the baby has to correlate with the seat. I think all this is a good thing. I’m all for protecting my grandkids, even if I do need a degree in engineering to figure it all out. But taking the seats in and out of the car every time we go to pick up the grandkids is a major pain. So I just leave the seats permanently anchored. If big people want to go back there, they’ll just have to squeeze in between them.

  All of which brings me to a huge difference between being a grandfather and a father. Your back.

  In my pre-grandad days, I could happily carry my kids—front or back—in a pack up hills and down dales and, though I may be romanticizing this (you think?) I rarely if ever felt a twinge in my back. We went to a skating rink, and I helped do up their laces, before doing mine, and I bent over and held them upright as we skated around the rink.

  We also went skiing. Somehow, we got them into their boots and carried their skis, and I helped teach them to ski while almost bending double. I held them as we went up T-bars and even rope tows, where I once burned my gloves clean through to the skin after half-holding the rope because a kid fell in front of us.

  I gave them piggybacks, shoulder-carries, and swung them. I lifted them in and out of cars with ease and onto trampolines and all those other physical activities you didn’t even think about.

  Nowadays, and I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit this, I sometimes need help getting my skates on. Sometimes my back hurts so much I can barely bend over. Perhaps bending over too much and lifting up my own kids is a contributing factor. Or age.

  Picking up your grandchild—lifting them off a swing or carrying them on your shoulders is still one of the most satisfying things you can do. But they get bigger and heavier real fast.

  The other day Emma was on the stairs at her home when she called out for me to “Stay right there, Grandad!” before leaping into my arms.

  I caught her. Put her down carefully. Then checked my back. So far, so good.

  “My turn,” said Linden.

  Thank goodness he’s a lot lighter than his sister.

  The Quiz

  “Let’s do a quiz, Grandad.”

  “Yes, yes, yes. A quiz!”

  “Pleeeeease, Grandad. A quiz.”

  “Quiz. Quiz. Quiz.”

  Sometimes we sing in the car, like we did with our kids, but for some reason all three of my grandchildren love quizzes in the car. I become Alex Trebeck and ask each of them in turn a question.

  These quizzes have helped get us through some very long car journeys. One, two or three of them—separately or together—want me to set questions on everything from animals to simple math or capitals of various countries.

  The problem is, one child is now ten, one six, and the other four. One size does not fit all. So while I may ask Mayana the name of the president of the United States, and Emma the capital of Canada, I will ask Linden what sound a cow makes.

  “Moo. Moo, Grandad.”

  “Brilliant. Pick up a Nobel Prize.”

  “What’s a noble prize?”

  I am actually a dab hand on animal noises. I can do all the basic farmyard animals and one or two more exotic wild creatures, such as bears, tigers, and lions (there’s a subtle difference between a roar and a growl). I can also do squirrels and hyenas and an eagle, which has to have one of the most pathetic screeches of any of the big birds—such a sad tweet for such a majestic creature.

  What I can’t do, apparently, is imitate an elephant.

  “What’s this?” I asked one afternoon in the general round, where anyone can chime in, and then let out a loud Phwheeeeccchhhhhh ... or some such noise.

  “What is that?” said Mayana, sounding disgusted. “It sounds awful.”

  “It’s a cat that’s dying,” said Emma, who has a vivid imagination and will likely grow up to produce horror movies.

  I did it again.

  “An orca whale,” guessed Mayana.

  “A cow,” said Linden.

  “A slug that’s been squished,” said Emma.

  “No, no, no,” I said. “This might help.”

  And then, taking one arm off the steering wheel, I stuck my shoulder up to my nose and then let loose another majestic Phweeeeeeeeechhh—careful to keep my eyes on the road and other hand firmly on the wheel. Don’t write in and complain.

  All three children collapsed into giggles

  “I know,” said Mayana. “It’s a dying seal with its tongue sticking out.”

  “No,” I said, a bit offended. “It’s an elephant.”

  A pause.

  “Are you seriously telling us you’re making the sound of an elephant?” asked Mayana incredulously.

  “That’s awful,” agreed Emma.

  “Is it still a cow?” asked Linden.

  That was so an elephant, I started to tell them but then looked in the rear-view mirror to see all of them waving their arms, trunk-like in front of them, making phwoor and phweeeee and moooo noises.

  I do find some comfort that the grandchildren are immensely entertained by quizzes, rather than burying their noses in an iPad, but before I get too holier-than-thou, there have been times on particularly long journeys when we’ve broken out a laptop and played a downloaded kids’ movie.

  The quizzes challenge me too. I have to work out questions on the fly that I think they have a fighting chance of answering, while moving between various subjects that might still entertain them.

  And if I’m a second-rate elephant impersonator, so be it. I am a first-rate doofus, and sometimes that’s all a grandfather has to be.

  Small Children Are Messy

  Just before our grandkids come to stay, I take one last look around the living room and kitchen, where everything is “kind of” in order. Kind of. My wife and I are not neat freaks. We go for comfort ahead of style. Nobody’s going to put our home in Architectural Digest magazine. Maybe in Homes in Urgent Need of Renovation Monthly.

  But, you know, we can see the carpet. We can walk on the kitchen floor. We can sit at the dining room table and read a book without facing permanent injury.

  One hour after the grandkids arrive, there is absolute chaos. Toy cars and Uno cards are strewn across the carpet, the kitchen floor is alive with popcorn and chocolate-flavoured cornflakes, the table is a minefield of books and unicorns and Lego pieces that dig
into your funny bone once you make the mistake of leaning your elbow onto the table.

  The chaos continues into the hall, up the stairs, onto the landing, and into various bedrooms, mine included because the bed makes the best trampoline, especially if you throw shirts and socks and many other soft and squishy things onto the mattress. And of course, there are the pillow fights, often instigated by my wife, who is frankly old enough to know better.

  “Don’t worry,” she says as my grandson thwacks her with a pillow, sending stuffing spilling everywhere. “We’ll put it all back together when they’ve gone home.”

  Ha!

  We do have some friends who are neat and tidy people and whose homes you could put in magazines, but they exist just to make us feel inferior. Some of them even have grandchildren. I think they tie them up in the corner until it’s time for them to go home again. I mean these people have figurines. I never see the point of figurines anyway, so we don’t have any. My sister collects figurines of women in frilly dresses and puts them in glass cases. They provide her with much enjoyment, so who am I to quibble. Even if figurines are idiotic and belong in museums. The old kind of museums where nobody goes anymore. Because they’re old. Any self-respecting museum these days has buttons to push and 3D glasses to wear and a nice coffee shop.