Blog like an Egyptian (part 4)

In the days before alcoholism (and later dementia) had gripped Aunty Betty between the teeth, spending time with her and Uncle Jim was always my favourite holiday choice.

She was great fun for one thing. Never having had any children of her own, Aunty Betty combined in my child-like eyes an embodiment of grown-up glamour with a dangerously thrilling edge. She dressed in trousers (slacks, as she called them) with brightly coloured revealing tops; she wore high heels to take us shopping by bus to Birkenhead market; she drank whisky and smoked cigarettes; she taught me card games and how to place bets with two pees and Swan Vestas. I felt grown up and priviledged to join her and Uncle Jim, my grandparents and old Mr Bridger at the dining room table, turned after completion of the evening meal into a card table littered with whisky glasses and overflowing ashtrays.

They taught me rummy and patience, and - thrillingly - 5 card stud and pontoon (black jack). All hands accompanied by precision betting and no prisoners taken on account of age (or lack of). The gambling was serioulsy approached, and winning a hand genuinely admired - and not in that patronising adult-to-child way to which I was more accustomed. The smoking and drinking and card playing would continue for hours, interupted perhaps around 10pm for some cream crackers and cheese.

By the time I introduced Aunty Betty to the ex years later, she was alcohol raddled and in the first tentative grasp of the dark shadow of dementia. It was hard to reconcile the slurring stumbling old lady with the vivacious and dangerously exciting woman of my childhood. When she vomited and fell off her chair during Christmas dinner one year, I knew my Aunty Betty was no more. The husk left behind did not do her justice.