My grandson has been coming to our house once a week ever since my daughter finally wrenched him off the boob, already a year old, huge and bald. I bought him a Keith Haring playmat, fed him bananas and tried not to turn the telly on too much.
Over the past three years, he has turned into a walking, talking boy who has already had his adenoids out and can mostly be relied on not to shit his pants. I say “mostly” with my fingers crossed. Until now, he’s been at nursery three times a week, running around with a gang of other small boys who call themselves “the Crazy Crew” (seriously) and occasionally have to have “carpet time” and “sit quietly” until they can play nicely.
Tuesday is my Nana Day. I am not available for other work on Tuesdays, unless someone is offering pots of money, which is increasingly rare these days – but let’s not get bitter.
Pop-Pop and I have done all the baby and toddler stuff: the petting zoos and library sing-songs, the meandering walks to the ducks, the parks and playgrounds. I have squeezed my flabby size-16 body down slides not designed for fat nanas and eaten all the leftover fish fingers, which is possibly why those slides are getting increasingly tight. I used to judge my weight by the zip of my Levi’s; now it’s by whether I need rescuing from a play tunnel I should never have entered in the first place.
