Belatedly sharing a bit more about our February visit to see our daughter E, son-in-law L, and granddaughters ABC and JG.
Most of the visit was spending time with the family at our rental home in their East London neighborhood. There were games and make-believe, reading, puzzles, drawing, watching BBC children’s programs, especially Swashbuckle, eating, napping, and even a couple of sleepovers for ABC and JG.
Our nod to the girls’ being on half-term break from school was a visit to the Tower of London. Given that we had a 3- and 6-year-old in tow, it wasn’t the most comprehensive visit, but we did see the Crown Jewels, the White Tower, and more cannons and armor than I’ve seen in the rest of my life combined.
ABC and JG were not enamored of the ravens.
London winters are much milder than here in the Northeast US, so daffodils were blooming at our rental house, even though it was only mid-February.
There was the excitement of ABC losing her fifth baby tooth. Of course, the Tooth Fairy arrived on schedule!
Mostly, though, the trip was a time for me, B, and T to be Nana, Grandpa, and Auntie. Because of the distance and infrequency of visits, we aren’t sure when we will be able to see them again, so it’s nice to have a remembrance of some snuggling time.
(In the photo at the top of the post, ABC’s bear is wearing a Binghamton Rumble Ponies hat. The Rumble Ponies are the AA baseball club of the New York Mets. Bear is trying on ABC’s cap.)
(Photo: ABC’s bear wearing a Binghamton Rumble Ponies cap)
Spouse B, daughter T, and I are in London this week visiting daughter E, son-in-law L, and granddaughters ABC and JG for half-term break. This first half of the week, both E and L are working, so our main goal is taking care of ABC and JG so they can do that.
The last time we were together in person was April when they came to our home in the US. Although we do video calls, they can’t really capture the changes that happen. JG, now 3 and attending full-day nursery school is chatting up a storm! She loves making puzzles, zooming around our rental house near their home, and following the lead of 6-year-old ABC, who likes or tolerates it most of the time. ABC, now in year 2 at school, is reading well and a master of make-believe. She can make up songs and lyrics on the spot, taking after her musically-and-literary-accomplished parents. ABC also enjoys dance and art.
I love watching B being Grandpa, playing games, reading stories, preparing meals and snacks, and dozing off during naptime. T is an involved auntie, playing endless games of hide-and-seek and whatever make-believe ABC has invented and giving gentle hugs, in deference to her still-healing shoulder.
My favorite thing is just being here as family. With the ocean between us, it’s a rare gift to snuggle on the couch, especially with JG who was born during the early part of the pandemic and whom we didn’t get to meet in person until she was a year old. Such a different grandparenting experience than with ABC who lived with us in the US until she was two.
For JG, I’m just Nana. ABC, though, remembers her Great-Nana, who passed away in 2019.
I miss my parents and wish I could be as good a grandparent as they were with E and T.
Nyad tells the story of Diana Nyad (Annette Bening), a long-distance swimmer and sports broadcaster, who, at age 60, decided to pursue her dream of being the first person to swim from Cuba to Florida in the open ocean, a distance of 110 miles. She had tried and failed in an attempt when she was 28 but, at 60, felt her mental toughness would make it possible. The film chronicles multiple attempts to reach this goal over several years with the assistance of her friend-turned-coach, Bonnie Stoll (Jodie Foster), and a team of experts who helped with specialized aspects of the swim, such as repelling sharks and jellyfish, navigation, and nutrition.
Even though I knew historically how the film would end, there was a lot of dramatic tension inherent in the telling. I also gained a new appreciation of the hazards involved and the amount of training and behind-the-scenes work involved in a project of this magnitude.
I am not a swimmer – or athletic in any way – and greatly respect those, like Nyad, who can accomplish such amazing feats. Kudos to Annette Bening and Jodie Foster, both of whom trained extensively in order to portray Nyad and Stoll, both of whom are accomplished athletes. The film does not use body doubles; Bening is doing the swimming, even in the most extreme segments.
I also appreciated that Bening and Foster insisted on not being “touched up” so that they appear as women in their sixties portraying women in their sixties. As a woman in my sixties, I appreciated that.
I also appreciated the sense that women in their sixties are mentally tough and ready to take on challenges and achieve life goals. Also, that we have learned a lot about ourselves and about life over the years and that we are (usually) ready to be part of a group to accomplish whatever it is we want.
Even if you are not a woman in your sixties like me, I think you would benefit from watching this film, which is currently streaming on Netflix and may be in theaters in some markets. It is appropriate for teens and adults.
(Image is an official poster for the movie through fandango.com)
Given that we live in the US and our granddaughters live in the UK, we prize any time that we have together.
Our five-year-old granddaughter ABC lived with us and her mom until she was a bit over two years old. Then, E’s spousal visa came through and they joined their spouse-and-dad in London. We made our first trip “across the pond” a couple of months later, hoping to return again in the spring, but that was 2020 and the pandemic struck, so, no.
We missed the birth and whole first year of granddaughter JG’s life. We met her first on a bittersweet trip here so that E could have a last visit with her grandfather Paco. We will always be grateful that Paco was able to meet JG and that ABC, who remembered him from living here when she was a baby/toddler, was able to see him and dance and sing for him. E was Paco’s first grandchild and it was so important that she got to see him one last time. I’m crying now just thinking about it. It was just after that visit that Paco began his last, steep decline and he died a few weeks later.
That visit had been very confusing for JG. As a pandemic baby, she hadn’t been out of her house very much, much less flown across an ocean and plunked down in a new country with new people. She was also at a developmental time of stranger anxiety, so we had to be careful not to intrude on her comfort zone.
Without having to care for Paco, we were able to make a couple of trips to the UK (although they happened to be during omicron surges); still, JG was not too sure about these people who occasionally appeared on her mom’s computer screen suddenly showing up.
Enter 2023. JG is now almost 2 and a half and having a surge in language development and is able to make connections that she had been too young to make previously. She starts calling us by name when we video chat and wanting to say hi and showing us things. When we went to visit earlier this month, she gave us hugs and played with us and let us pick her up and called us by name and stayed with us at our Airbnb while her mom and dad did errands and snuggled and fell asleep cuddled on the couch.
For the first time, she knew we were her grandparents, her mom’s mom and dad. Correction: her mum‘s parents, as mom is the more common American expression and she is, of course, adopting the more British mum.
What a prize! I had been afraid that JG wouldn’t really remember us because we are so far away and that occasional visits wouldn’t be enough to establish a real relationship with her as we have enjoyed with her sister ABC.
Transatlantic grandparenting will still be challenging. I don’t have personal experience with such a long distance between grandparents and grandchild, but I think we’ll figure it out.
We are hopeful that E and her family will be here in April for Easter, JG’s first trip back since she came to meet Paco just after she turned one. I don’t think she will remember having been here, although ABC will probably still remember every nook and cranny of our house and yard, as she did when they came back to see Paco a year and a half ago.
It was a week ago that we said our good-byes to fly back to the States. Anticipating a visit from them in just a few weeks made it easier to leave them. Although JG won’t remember the house, she will remember us.
Joanne Corey 