The story behind my Venetian glass necklace

This weekend my gran (Joan Anderson) surprised me with a gift of a necklace she has treasured since she was a very young lady.

Just before the start of World War 2 her spinster aunt went on a world cruise with my gran’s grandparents and arrived back with a gift of Venetian glass beads.

Unbeknown to her, from the time I was old enough to dress-up in her petticoats and dance around her dressing room in her jewellery, I have admired this necklace.

The beads look like molten lava – to this day I have never seen one quite like it. Of course, I never expected to be given such a gift, but I believe it is symbolic of the way my gran loves all her grandchildren – as naturally and as easily as breathing.

Only since I have had my own child have I come to fully appreciate the role she has played in my life.

Seeing Daniël with my mom (“Danny Rwose”) and dad (“Papa Bwuce”) and the incredible love they have for him has given me cause to reflect on this.

My parents started The Courier not long after I was born and they worked incredibly hard, especially in the early years.

During school holidays they could not always take time off so I would spend weeks at a time on the dairy farm with granny and grandpa.

It was heaven.

My cousins lived up the road and if we weren’t outside at milking, illegally climbing the grain silos or building forts there were always freshly baked biscuits in the pantry to be raided, a dress-up box filled with sequined dresses and feather boas for our elaborate plays and an attic full of antiques to explore.

If I look back in time I can easily picture a younger version of gran in her sun hat working among her flowers (she had the most spectacular garden) and grandpa in his gumboots tending his vegetables.

I used to love pulling out fresh carrots and eating them after rinsing them under the garden tap.

My gran loves to bake and I remember helping her in the kitchen and most importantly relishing the opportunity to lick the bowl at the end.

At Easter she taught us how to make and decorate our own chocolate Easter eggs – an elaborate process that kept us busy the entire week leading up to Easter.

There is so much that I treasure from those memories that I could fill books with descriptions of farm life.

But at the centre of it all is always gran and grandpa, constant, dependable and unchanging.

They really were second parents and their home was my home.

I clearly remember one holiday as a very young child at the seaside with my extended family where after a week my parents had to go back to work but gran and grandpa were there so that was fine.

But then they had to go too and I had the option of going with them or staying with all my cousins.

I stayed and that night I was inconsolable.

Distraught, I realised too late that without their presence I was ‘homesick’.

For a child being homesick has nothing to do with where you are and everything to do with who you are with.

Grandpa passed away when I was 10 and my gran soldiered on, the matriarch of a family of four grown children, nine grandchildren and more recently 10, soon to be 11, great grandchildren.

I hope I too will have the opportunity to mold young lives with as much gentleness and grace.