Granjoy

Granjoy was a grandmother young at heart, she made up her own name for herself as a granny. Her name was Joyce and her friends and family called her Joy, so to her grandchildren she was Granjoy.

She was a social person and enjoyed taking part in team sports, tennis or badminton and later golf. I think she was playing golf regularly right into her eighties. Granjoy was a practical, no nonsense lady and had no time for fuss. She would expect us to muck in and get on with it. She was part of the Women’s Institute and whenever we came to stay, she would encourage us to come along with her and meet her friends.

Gardening and growing fruit and vegetables were her passion and that was visible in her garden. She bottled her own jam and chutney, baked her own bread, made apple or rhubarb pie fresh from the garden, nothing was too difficult, it all miraculously happened without any fuss.

I would say she was a proper English country lady, she loved the outdoors and enjoyed being part of the local community. She was proud of her family and would fill her friends in on what each of us was doing. We know this because on one occasion my father and Nicola were invited to Granjoy’s golf club to have lunch. It turned out that her friends knew more about our family than we did ourselves.

Granjoy, my mother and Nicola - Brookmans Park

An endearing part of Granjoy was her mischievous sense of humour. She loved to have fun and joke with us. She was always interested in what we were doing from when we were little right until we were grown ups. When we moved to the Canary Islands, she decided to take up Spanish so she could converse with the locals when they came to visit. She would practice at every opportunity. We would sit on the couch next to her, Granpop on the other chair, far enough away to be just out of the line of communication. He would often stare straight ahead of him watching the world go by outside whilst we chattered and giggled.

Every so often Granjoy would turn to Granpop and say, did you hear that dear? Granpop never did. The question was repeated again.

Dear?

Giving a sidelong glance he would reply, Yes Dear.

And Granjoy would repeat the sentence a few decibels higher. At this point, there was a slight irritation from both sides. Granjoy would ask Granpop if he’d turned himself on and reluctantly he would flick his hearing aid switch. At that moment the conversation would change, our voices raised so that Granpop could hear, there was a stiltedness as we repeated the story. It lacked fluency and the humour fell on deaf ears.

Nevertheless, this scenario was repeated time and time again.

When I was in my 20s I spent a month with Granjoy and Granpop. My father had set a task for me, or should I say a challenge. I had battled to pass my drivers test. My mother said I’d let the side down. All the family had passed first time except me. I had failed twice and my father was not prepared to see me fail one more time. So I was sent to G&G on the understanding that I had one job and that was to pass my test. I focused, took the lessons and passed. Granjoy was overjoyed.

No sooner had half an hour passed and we had all calmed down, Granjoy said Right Dear, I expect you’ll be leaving tomorrow then?

As lovable as Granjoy was, she was also incredibly direct.

Granjoy teaching me how to catch a ball