Last night, my Grandma, Terry Lawlor-Smith, died in her McLaren Vale nursing home, in the presence of family members. She was 78.
We were close, and during the time we had, we had some great times. From a very young age, right up until I was almost 18, I would regularly stay with her in McLaren Vale. We’d see movies and hire videos and play carpet bowls and Grand Canasta. For the first 10ish years, she drove me around, then for the last few, I drove her. She showed me how to make an excellent roast, which still has the rest of the family marvelling at my fantastic cooking ability. The funny thing is it’s not even that hard; peel vegetables, coat them with oil and cook them for an hour, there you go.
As a child, I rarely drank soft drinks. It wasn’t until I started working at Kmart and I was earning my own money that I started buying my own and keeping it in my little fridge. So when I was little, going to Grandma’s and having unlimited access to all the caffeine-free diet coke I could drink was a real treat. I probably took it a little too far… But to you I say, don’t knock it until you get up in the morning, and pour yourself a bowl of porridge and a glass of coke. Hmm mmm.
Grandma was a smoker. She quit in the mid 1990s but she smoked for practically her whole life. Understandably this had quite an affect on her ability to breathe, and any small cold quickly turned into a trip to the hospital. To the smokers out there today, to you I say, you are idiots. The evidence has existed for decades now, that smoking will eventually kill you. If it weren’t for cigarettes, my Grandma would still be alive today, or at the very least, her quality of life would have been much better in her final years. But really, that’s what it’s all about; “quality of life.” Who wants to live to be 100 if you don’t know where you are and can’t do anything yourself? It was Grandma’s decision not to return to hospital, and I respect that.
I last saw her on Monday. I told her the latest news with me. She said it was good to see me and we each said “I love you.” Of course it’s sad. But hey, that’s life. I’m really going to miss her.
Yours sincerely,
David M. Green
