Captured moments of Ivy

Smurf,

I am sorry to hear that you did not have the extended family I was very lucky to enjoy in my formative years. This grandmother was English, from London and she was very different to my other grandmother. I had my grandparents into my late 20's. Both sets of grandparents even met my children. However, we left Waterford when I was 12 so the contact was not great again until I was an adult and I went back to Waterford and reconnected with my aunts, uncles and grandparents. My mother being ill all of my life was a problem so when we left Waterford, I had to take over looking after my siblings and my mother too. I became a mother figure and still am to my brothers and sister who was born when I was 12. My father was there and he was a good man but did not know how to deal with my mother's mental illness and drinking. I did not know how to deal with it either but I managed the best I could. 

I won't change the poem, it is a poem that came to me one day when I was thinking about her and I do smile when I remember her. She was seen as the stern, disciplinarian grandmother, one that was hated by my cousins and my mother always said her life was a misery growing up with her, it caused her illnesses. I can only say that I experienced a very different person, a capable woman who was very practical and ran a guest house and an electrical business with my grandfather, she worked all of her life and ended up with dementia. There is a long history of her life. She was stern for a reason, she lost her father in the Somme in 1916, her mother died in 1922 and she was orphaned with 5 sisters when she was 16. As the eldest, she was taken by her maternal grandmother to work in a stamp factory and separated from her 5 sisters who were sent to an orphanage. She never got to see them again. I found all of her sisters ( all deceased) but have direct contact with their children and their children's children (my second cousins). I plan to visit them all sometime this year. I think she would be happy that I found her sisters for her and have reconnected her family with mine once again. 

Smurf, when my children flew the nest, hubby had to fly too. We left Ireland in 1980's in our 20's and came back to Ireland in 2004 as our youngest was going to University here and I felt there was a future in Ireland ....and look at what has happened. Hubby was allowed work from the Dublin office for 4 years and is gone since 2008 he works out of Luxembourg but is in a different destiation every week with his job. I tried to live with him there but he is not there either so I now mind the family home here in Greystones and he comes home most weekends. I skype with all of them all.  Life is a strange one but we manage as best we can. I stopped working to go abroad to be with my husband but that was the silver lining, I am so happy not to be working now and to have time to write and paint. I miss family life but I love the weekends when hubby is home. So, that's my life for now. Maire x

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Pat,

Thank you for your comments.

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