What Grandma taught me about love

On needs vs desires

Hola, hola!

Love that I can pretend this is coming to you on a Monday because it’s Bank Holiday in the UK which is just an extended Sunday.

A fave friend sent me a voice note cackling about how my Hot Girl Summer has turned into a Hot ‘spend time with your Grandma’ Summer. It’s true, I’ve been in Alicante with my 82 year old Grandma for the last week. She is my father’s mother — the white side of the fam — and I do not have a relationship with her to speak of. I’d say my grandma and I are quite different people.

For example, I voted remain and she’ll say, ‘I hope we don’t go back into Europe,’ while she drinks a brew on her Spanish balcony. She’s lived here 28 years and still greets every person with a strong Yorkshire, ‘Ello luv.’ Hola and gracias are about the extent of her Spanish. Then there’s the Royal Family chat — more than I could ever care for — with that opinion and Camilla is an ‘ugly cow however you dress her.’ Oh and Camilla has dead bodies in her house? Don’t ask. Of course, there’s Covid conspiracies which we’re not going to go into. Then there’s food. Let’s just say I made sure we went out for dinner when a frozen spaghetti bolognese pizza was pulled out. Again, don’t ask.

I joke about but the bottom line is I don’t really feel a connection to her aside from a sense of duty. I think my series of unfortunate events (long story) was meant to happen to end up here — for both her and I.

Grandma’s love life

Grandma got married young. She married for security. Her story goes that my great grandparents were getting divorced and she thought she’d take over the lease of the cute cottage they lived in. It was, however, taken away as my great grandad was caught stealing the electric and gas money out of one of those prepayment metre things where you put coins in to get your energy. When she first told the story I thought she meant he was syphoning off the electricity and gas which I sort of thought was quite impressive. Stealing coins is way less cool. Oh well.

They divorced and she went on to find and marry the man she says was good to her and the kids. The man whose surname I carry. He passed away way too young. Maybe it’s easier to look back at the dead with rose tinted glasses but there’s definitely a familial sense of gratitude to my adopted grandfather.

Grandma doesn’t remember that she got married a third time. Dementia has relieved her from the memories of the family laughing stock.

In my living memory, my Grandma has always been single but she’s always been surrounded by people. The thing about Grandma is she’s nothing if not fun: super social, involved in lots of community groups, and the life of a party. She’s a flirt (yes, this is doing some heavy lifting when it comes to my inheritance). She loves to dance. Good at it too: waltz, samba, ballroom… she can do it all. Plus, she was showing me a TikTok dance she’d learnt. She’s always liked men who can dance too, whether they were single or not: ‘But just to dance, luv. No funny business. Those women would get so jealous over nothing.’

The impact

There’s probably a much longer piece I need to think about when it comes to being mixed race and what that has meant for my attitude towards love and sex. For example, I think about my worry about divorce and how it comes from this side of the family. Not the fact Grandma got divorced, but the shit people say about her because of it. But it’s not a piece I’m quite ready to write yet.

But I will tell you how this week has made me feel. Grandma tells me she’s lonely. Lots of her friends have passed away or moved back to the UK during the pandemic. She misses her social life. She misses dancing. Two widows have recently moved into her building. She tells me she finds it hard to understand one of them — she is Belgian — but even to have a coffee with another person, even if she’s just nodding away unawares, is better than not having one. There are no men in her life. I ask her if she wishes there were. She says, ‘I’ve learnt a lot of lessons. But I’m too old to put them into practice now.’ She tells me she just wants companionship. I’m tempted to reply and say it’s never too late but I can’t help but think that maybe it is.

I look at my ageing grandma I wonder if what she craves now — companionship — was the need she prioritised when looking for a partner. It’s made me think a lot about what we prioritise when we look for a partner. And how we investigate our needs.

Awareness of needs

Did she know what her needs vs her desires looked like? Although she doesn’t go into it, I gather that Grandma allowed herself to be wooed quickly. I wonder what her life would have looked like if she’d aligned her needs with her desire; if she’d had access to the information we have; if she’d had the privilege of not having to look for stability; if she could have made decisions from a place of independence; if she had the therapy and self help that discusses the importance of choosing the right partner at her disposal; if she’d been taught the importance of alignment.

I wonder what her life would have been like if she knew she needed a person who made her laugh, even through the hard times. Someone who was on an equal footing with her, where there was no question of power dynamic. Someone who had an understanding that roles change and change again and again over time through health, life, situations… Where there’s mutual care, not domination (that kept for the bedroom… Consensually).

I wonder what her life would have looked like if she knew she needed a man she could have had endless conversations with, even after having had every conversation. I wonder if she needed a man who read, so that there was always something to talk about.

How would she have seen the world with a man by her side who cared deeply about her wellbeing as much as they cared about their own?

Did she need a man who was spiritual and deeply understood his relationship to his faith and could support her on her journey with hers? She talks to me a lot about holding on to God strongly, but loosening her grip on her Bible.

I wonder what her life would have been like with a man who wasn’t afraid to not socially conform when it didn’t benefit the relationship.

Or maybe that’s what I need. And I’m projecting. Maybe.

I’m just saying that a lot of us choose a partner based on what it is we think we want right now. Often that’s physical attraction. Lust. A want for sex — especially if we’ve not dated or had it for a while. The importance of sex becomes overly weighted and it’s not always entirely an internal need — everyone else is talking about having sex or looking for sex, and there becomes this societal pressure to not let the ‘dry’ period go on for too long (whatever too long means) emphasised by popular culture. Don’t get me wrong, if anyone knows the importance of a physical relationship where mind, body, spirit feel safe enough to let go with another person, it’s me. But it’s one pillar of a bigger relationship structure. Sex is a fundamental need for most people, but we often confuse a fleeting sense of wanting someone with the deeper need for long-term sexual fulfilment. The two can overlap — wanting a person and needing sexual connection — but they’re not the same. Desire can feel urgent and consuming but it’s not the same thing as sustained satisfaction. They overlap, of course, but there is a distinction.

When I look at my Grandma I see the truth we don’t like to often say out loud because it means facing the Big Fears. A longterm partner is likely to be with you through some of life's biggest moments: love and loss, children and parental deaths, career changes, libido changes… Not to mention ageing bodies and minds. It reminds me that there must be alignment in why a relationship is entered into and an understanding of the needs that both parties are coming to it with. And because I can’t help caveating myself to not fall into the trap of ‘Love solves all’, I will say: there must also be an understanding of the need for external relationships — friendships, family, community — to enable the success of a couple.

Oh and as far as my Hot Girl Summer, we’re back on track. But that’s a story for another day. Por qué no los dos?