llywela | life, death and family

I spent most of yesterday at the funeral and wake of my great-uncle George, who died last week at the age of 80 after quite a long illness. As is usual, with that side of the family, there was a big turnout. Heck, just in that one branch of the family alone, George and Margie had four children, 18 grandchildren, five great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild! Once you start adding in the extended family, the numbers soon mount up! I couldn't count how many of us crammed into the Ffynnon Wen for the wake, but I'd say it was upwards of 60, maybe closer to 80 over the course of the evening, as people came and went, ranging in age from Auntie Margie at 82 down to baby Millie-Rose, aged just 10 weeks! All connected, somehow or other, although most of us were hazy on some of those connections. My great-aunt Marion, who was over from Ireland, took one look at me and said "I know you're one of us, but don't ask me to put a name to you!" It was that kind of day!

Auntie Margie and Auntie Marion were my Granddad's two youngest sisters, who were born in 1929 and 1931 at the tail end of a family of 10 children. In the early '50s, they met a pair of Irish twin brothers named George and Bobby who were stationed nearby with the army. Margie married George and Marion married Bobby, which meant their children were doubly related! And that little quartet of great-uncles and great-aunts were responsible for one of the most outrageous of the stories in my family history - one of those ridiculous true stories that are the reason I rarely find soap operas far-fetched! Bobby and Marion had a son named Michael, and then Bobby was sent off overseas with the army for a year...and came back to find Marion pregnant by another man. This was 1954, so it was a big scandal. Bobby agreed to take Marion back, but he wasn't prepared to raise another man's child. And that was where George and Margie came in, Bobby's twin brother and Marion's sister and best friend, as they agreed to adopt Marion's baby, Margaret, and raise her as their own. It was an open secret within the family, of course...but the children were never told. Bobby and Marion moved to Ireland and had three more children, while George and Margie stayed in Cardiff and raised Margaret, eventually having three more children of their own. And those children grew up. As teenagers in the early '70s, Margaret became very close to her cousin Michael from Ireland when he came over to visit. They fancied that they had fallen in love, declared that they wanted to get married - which they believed they were allowed to do, as first cousins. Imagine the shock, then, when the family were forced to reveal that long-held secret: that they were, in fact, half-brother and sister instead of cousins!

Yeah, if you put a story like that on Coronation Street or Neighbours it would be called contrived - but then, my family has always been a bit of a soap opera!

Here's another soap opera-esque story about Uncle George. A few years ago, back in the '90s, he was in the pub one evening when an armed robber burst in and tried to rob the place. George wrestled him to the ground for having the audacity to call him 'old man'! Old soldier, see - that training never really goes away, apparently! He was a lovely man: funny and generous - and an amazing cook, to boot!

There aren't many left of that generation now. Of the ten children born to my great-grandparents, only their three daughters - Ivy, Margie and Marion - are left. When I spoke to Auntie Marion yesterday and asked how she was, knowing that she's not been well lately, she looked sad. "I've not been right since the boys died," she said. She lost her three remaining brothers and a brother-in-law in the space of a single year not so long ago. And now George is gone. Auntie Ivy has gone into a nursing home, as her Alzheimers is advancing quite rapidly now - mind, she is 91, so she's not done badly. Dad visited her the other week and found her trying to escape. "I want to go home to my mum and dad," she rather plaintively told him. So he asked her how old she was, wondering how far back she'd gone in her mind. "I'm 91!" she said. And she knew who he was. But somehow that reality had got mixed up in her mind with those long ago days when her parents were still alive. Auntie Margie is also starting to get confused. One by one we are losing them all - so must make the most of them while they are still with us.

So, inevitably, here come the photos. Here are George and Margie on their wedding day in 1953, surrounded by the family

George and Margie celebrating their ruby wedding anniversary in 1993 - I love this photo, 40 years on and you can see how much they still loved each other