My Grandfather

The other day Maggie Hambling’s sculpture of Oscar Wilde became the unfortunate victim of vandalism when the vandals sawed off the offending fag. I know what you’re probably thinking, but no. This was not an act of homophobia. He was not vandalised because he was a famous bummer, but because the sculpture depicts him smoking. The vandals removed the cigarette he was holding in his hand!

A few weeks ago a French magazine airbrushed a Cartier Bresson photograph of Jean Paul Sartre appearing in the publication – a familiar practice in modern publishing, only this airbrushing procedure was to remove the cigarette from between his fingers.

I couldn’t help but wonder what both Wilde and Sartre would have said if someone had told them that there would be a point in the future where society would be more concerned by each ones lack of regard for their own health than for their “depraved, amoral, scandalous opinions and actions”? I’m pretty sure they would have found it highly amusing. In a way I suppose it’s a pretty good, if not ironic, indictment of how society has started to get it’s priorities right.

On a not entirely unrelated note, after having smoked for 60 years my 86 year-old Grandfather has finally quit. It would be a misnomer to cite his quitting as a good health measure as the cancer that is riddling his chest is gonna be taking him down pretty soon anyway. I saw him yesterday and congratulated him. With a wry smile he quipped, “Well, it was never doing me much good.”

A few years ago I worked on the Department of Health’s anti-smoking campaign. One of my roles was to organise publicity for an ad that Christy Turlington had appeared in for the NHS Smoking Helpline, in which she talked about losing her father, Dwayne, to smoking related lung cancer. During the media tour to publicise the commercial Christy, my boss and I had a lunch, over which we discussed some of the things that no one tells you about lung cancer. She said that while nursing her father the thing that struck her most was the smell of the cancer in his lungs. She said it wasn’t in itself an unpleasant smell, but for her it literally was the smell of death.

Prior to yesterday the last time I saw my Grandfather was at Christmas. He was diagnosed with having lung cancer back in October last year, so I was aware at Christmas that he had it, but he’d actually appeared to be fairly healthy and in fairly good spirits. When I saw him yesterday (he moved from my aunt’s house to the nursing home that my Mum works at last week) I was really, really shocked at how quickly he had deteriorated. He’s very, very thin now, almost skeletal in fact, and he has very little strength (for example, we have to leave the bathroom door open in his room because he can’t turn the handle). But what really bought it home to me was the smell that Christy had described. Before, when she’d mentioned that smell, there had been a part of me that had thought she was perhaps being a melodramatic supermodel. But sure enough there it was, enforcing me to visualise the cancer slowly, but surely, encroaching on his lungs.

At the very best he probably has about six months left. He knows that, although it isn’t really discussed. The thing is, he really wants to go back to my Aunt’s house, but it’s not a good idea as he has to climb the stairs to his bedroom and he isn’t really strong enough any more. Also, if he deteriorates any more while staying at my Aunt’s, he’ll end up having to spend his final days in an overcrowded ward at the Royal United Hospital in Bath. He’s able to stay where he is now and while he may not be able to close his bedroom door and while he may not have his family around him all the time (although as Mum works there, so he’ll see a lot more of his family than many of the other residents), he will be able to stay there until the end and it’ll be a lot more dignified and comfortable than the alternative.

The hardest thing for my Mum and my Aunt has been having these kinds of discussions with him without actually really referring to the finality. They’ve been doing their best, but they tend to get very emotional when talking to him, as he himself gets quite upset and tearful. So part of the reason that I went over to see him yesterday was not only to pay him a visit but because my Mum wanted him to receive another voice of opinion, to help him make a well informed decision as to what to do and where he wants to be.

I’d already told Mum that I wasn’t going to be softly, softly with him, because he’s already getting that from her and my Aunt. So I went in by myself and sat down next to him and for a while we talked about the football (clearly, being gay and knowing nothing about football, I talked a lot of crap). Then I began to steer the conversation onto the subject of his care.

I began by telling him that I didn’t like the colour of the walls in his room and that I was going to bring in some pink paint and a ladder so that he could decorate, which made him laugh (how my Grandparents haven’t clocked on to me yet, I will never know). Then I talked to him a bit more seriously. I told him that I wasn’t going to patronise him by beating around the bush. I asked him what the doctors had told him about his prognosis and he told me that they had said it would be a case of a few months (which I already knew). Then I said in that case I thought that going back to my Aunt’s wasn’t maybe the best thing to do and I explained all the reasons why he should maybe stay put - that it would be easier, more comfortable and that at the most important time he would have a greater degree of privacy than he would in a hospital.

We didn’t actually talk for very long, but he didn’t get upset which I was pleased about. I told him that he didn’t have to decide right then and there, but that he needed to tell Mum and my Aunt in the next day or so, so that they could prepare for him coming home if needs be. But I told him if he did decide to stay then we’ll bring him his TV and DVD player and that I’ll send him some DVDs. I asked him what movies he likes, fully expecting him to cite Gene Kelly movies, so I was a bit surprised when he said “Die Hard”.

When I dropped Mum off at the home this morning I popped in to see him for a few minutes and he told Mum and I that he thinks he has decided to stay put, which is good news. Apparently my Uncle had a similar conversation with him last night, so maybe together we’d convinced him. Anyhoo – it looks like I’m off into town soon to buy the Die Hard trilogy.

I wonder if I should sneak in a copy of Moulin Rouge or The Birdcage as well?