nana maggs

‘You remember Beattie, she was the one who had a breast off and got trod on by a horse.’

‘Anyway, it was just one of them things’

Conversations would often end like this with Margaret. Or begin like this. With incongruity and inconclusion. Like the time she opened the front door in her pants and a vest and declared, ‘Of course, I’ve never been fat’. This was especially odd, given she had indeed been quite fat at points and no one had been present when the first half of this thought, which necessitated the ‘of course’, had occurred. Or when, watching the Noel’s House Party, she confirmed – in case anyone had been wondering – that she ‘didn’t have the AIDS. No, definitely not’.

Gifts were similarly inimitable. Like the time she gave her granddaughter all of her spoons. Like, all of them. And her industrial-size deep fat fryer because she was ‘beyond that stage of cooking’. In the past she cooked everything in there, apparently: ‘Chops. Eggs. The lot’.

Life advice was abundant from Margaret:

‘If you don’t want a fight, wear a big hat.’

‘Don’t worry, giving birth is like shelling peas.’

‘Don’t sit on the floor, you’ll get kinkoff’

‘There’s just too much fuss made about babies these days.’

‘Kittens are for drowning’

‘If you need to kill a dog. Just take it in garden. Tie it to a tree. And shoot it.

And so on.

It was quieter in the care home. Behind glass because of the virus. In the care home she would weep as she asks if her daughter is dead. She weeps quietly when she remembers that her daughter is dead. She weeps because that must mean she has forgotten. And isn’t that just awful. To forget your child is dead. And then remember. Again. And again. It was quieter in the home. So quiet she didn’t mention when they forget to put her teeth in and brush her hair for a week. So quiet that she forgets that she isn’t going home. And they forget to tell her that you’ve called. And she forgets she wants to die. And later remembers again. And isn’t that just awful. To forget you want to die and then remember again. They forget she doesn’t like jelly and ice cream. And she forgets her Ruby man is long, long gone. And yet the days go on. And on. In a quiet dance of forgetting.

‘Is your mother dead?’ she asks.

‘She is yes, nana’

‘Oh’

The line falls silent.

‘It’s just one of them things’, she says. Just one of them things.