A letter to her grandchildren: on being useful, on saying the unsaid things, and on asking before it is too late.
My darling grandchildren,
By the time you read this properly, really read it, I expect I will be gone, or close to it. That is not a sad thing to write. It is simply true, and I have always found the truth easier to carry than the alternatives. So here are a few things I want you to have, from me, in my own words.
Be useful. Find a thing you can do that helps someone in a way that cannot be argued with, and do it well. It does not matter what it is. The pride I have felt in my life has almost never come from things that were easy or things that were praised. It came from work done properly when no one was watching.
Say the unsaid things. I have sat with too many people at the end who were full of words they had saved up and left too late. Do not save them up. Tell people what they are to you while they can still hear it. It will feel awkward and you will do it badly and it will matter more than almost anything else you do.
And ask. This is the one I feel most strongly, so forgive me if I press it. Ask the people you love about their lives while they are here to answer. I almost did not make this book. I thought who would want to read about a nurse from a house by the harbour. But my granddaughter asked me, and kept asking, and here it is, and I am so glad. A life that is not asked about is a light left off in a room no one ever enters. Turn the lights on. Ask.
I loved you from before some of you existed, which is a thing only a grandmother can say and mean.
Your Gran,
Eleanor