A HUNDRED AND ONE AGGRAVATIONS
Lucinda Bredin tried to arrange for an official telegram for her grandmother's centenary things couldn't have gone worse
AS MY grandmother's 100th birthday approached, the subject came up with increasing urgency in conversations with my father. 'I've drawn up a chart,' he said. 'Forty-five people are going to be spread over three days. They are allowed about two hours with her each, and then they've got to go.' My grandmother, who lives by herself in the country, is not one who likes parties, particularly if they interrupt the racing. But for her 100th it was felt that something must be done.
The discussions were endless: about food, about people, about timing, about flowers. 'And then', said my father, 'there's the telegram. The official telegram from the Queen.' The telegram?' I gasped. 'Does one actually have to organise it?' Our post brings unsolicited birthday greet- ings from McDonald's, Reader's Digest and a hotel in Greece with a sinister-sounding name. One assumed that the Palace was simply given a print-out of the 100th birth- days by St Catherine's House. `Ah,' said my father, 'not exactly. In fact, I've just been on the phone to the Queen's press office.'
My father had been alerted to the prob- lem about the telegram by his cousin, who had ordered one for her mother, Aunt Dot, who's now cruising towards 103. 'We did it through the Lord Lieutenant', the cousin said rather grandly, 'three months in advance.' But that was three years ago, and it seems that the procedure has changed. My father was advised to call the anniversaries office, also sited in Bucking- ham Palace. There they told him that, yes, it was true that 'a telemessage' had to be ordered. We could do it through that office, but they required three weeks' warning and a copy of the birth certificate. The correct procedure, however, was to apply through the DSS: 'They've got all the facts in their files; the local benefits office goes to interview the centenarian to see if she would like to receive a telegram.'
The spontaneity of the gesture seemed to be draining away faster than a unit trust at Morgan Grenfell, and there was another problem. As the widow of a colonial gover- nor in Africa, my grandmother has rather an old-fashioned attitude to words like 'benefits' and 'social security'. In fact, there had already been an incident with the local DSS, when they had had the 'neck' (her word) to offer the services of one of their home helps. She had dealt with this in a less than gracious way by announcing, through a barely opened door, that she did not want someone from the council poking around in her things. This had clearly crossed my father's mind. How was the man from the council going to get in, let alone find out whether a tele- gram was desirable? As my father said in a resigned tone, 'She'll say no .. , she says no to everything else.'
A woman at the local branch of the DSS was quite nice about it. 'Oh yes, we do understand the problem. The old folk are a bit of a law unto themselves. But unfor- tunately we will have to interview the old
lady to . . . urn check out her creden- tials. I'm afraid we do need proof. There have been instances.. .. ' she muttered darkly. 'The other thing is, yes, we do also have to ask whether she wants one. Old people can be very funny about their age.' Clearly keeping the telegram a surprise was out of the question.
The first time we knew that the DSS had paid my grandmother a visit was when she telephoned us. She sounded displeased: 'A man from the council came round and wants a whole lot of-things. I can't find any of them. I'm in such a muddle.' She had let him in, but fortunately without wearing her hearing-aid, so the pre-counselling for the telemessage had fallen on literally deaf ears. But we did see Mr DSS on his sec- ond visit. He was a huge, gangling York- shireman with a bulg-ing briefcase which looked as if it might contain yesterday's sandwiches. 'There is a hitch,' he said. 'Your mother doesn't have a birth certifi- cate.' Of course she doesn't,' we wanted
'Keep looking. It's here somewhere.' to bark, 'she's 100 years old.' Who can hang on to a piece of paper that was writ- ten when Queen Victoria was still on the throne? There was an even greater hitch. Through a quirk of fate, my grandmother had been born in Galveston, Texas, so one couldn't even make a dash to the record office to crank out a new one.
This telegram was beginning to cause more problems than anything dispatched by Zimmermann. But then Mr DSS cracked. 'Look, a passport or a wedding certificate will do. Even without the docu- ments, I can see she's got a strong claim. But could you keep us informed if there becomes no reason for celebration?' We took this to mean if my grandmother fell at the final fence. He continued, 'There have been some very unfortunate incidents when congratulatory greetings have been deliv- ered to a funeral.'
The day finally arrived. So did my grand- mother. My cousin Piers loaded up his camcorder, pressed the pause button and the four generations of our family waited. Nine o'clock. The breakfast table, the usual scene of letter-opening, was cleared but there was still no sign of the post. Ten o'clock, 11 o'clock, noon. Still no post. What sort of telegram — or telemessage for that matter — arrives after lunch? My father couldn't bear it any longer and thought of ringing up to see if another flash strike had been called — there had been one the day before.
Then came the crunch of gravel in the drive. The red post van was nosing its way to the front door, and a postman with dis- concertingly long hair brought in a vast bundle. In his hand was a telemessage. The telemessage was 'printed on paper pro- duced from fully sustained forests'. We tore it open. It read: Warm congratulations on the occasion of your one hundredth birthday. My best wishes go out to you for a most enjoyable day.
(Signed) Peter Lilley Peter Lilley? 'I don't know him,' said my grandmother. 'Was he in the Sudan?' It was an unbearable moment. More than 60 birthday cards had arrived from places as far-flung as Montreal, New South Wales and Houston. But the Queen hadn't deliv- ered. No wonder the monarchy was in trou- ble. But the postman was clearly milking the occasion for drama. He waved another envelope. This one, again produced by a politically correct forest, revealed a truly rotten watercolour of Windsor Castle by Paul Hogarth, which looked as if it had been dashed off from the tourist coach park with his engine still running. On the other side, however, was the royal crest embossed in gold. This was more like it:
I am delighted to send you my warm congrat- ulations on your one hundredth birthday. My best wishes to you for an enjoyable celebration on Thursday the 8th August. Elizabeth R My grandmother held it up to her nose to get a closer look: 'Who told her?'
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