As my dear friend Clint reminded me yesterday, after a tooth extraction it’s important to rinse the mouth with salt water. The dentist also gave me these instructions. As I made up the solution this morning I thought of my late grandma Katy. She gargled with salt water every morning and was never ill and rarely ever caught a cold. She died just before her 94th birthday after just one month of sickness.

Born in Odessa she arrived in this country as a babe in arms. The journey on a ship alongside other poor immigrants would have been uncomfortable and frightening. As I watch those fleeing Afghanistan I think of grandma’s family fleeing life threatening pogroms and poverty and travelling to an unknown future in a strange land, leaving so many relatives behind that they would never see or speak to again.

Grandmas family crowded into a two up two down tenement in the East End of London. Katy went to school but left as soon as she could to earn money hand rolling cigarettes in a factory. All the children had to contribute to the family finances as early as possible. During the First World War grandma met a young New Zealand lad at a dance. He was en route to fighting in France. These are two cards that he sent grandma.

I don’t know if grandma would have married him and gone across the water again to another new, strange land to live on a sheep farm. She wasn’t a great animal lover so the thought of grandma being a farmer’s wife seemed a bit far fetched. As it was she married Sam and they stayed together through a difficult marriage which produced a precious only child, father of my brother and me.

Kate adored her two grandchildren and then had the bonus of two great grandchildren

Grandma outlived Sam and she was often a visitor to our East Finchley home in London for Friday night dinner. She would surreptitiously feed bread and crisps to our dog, Peggy, under the table all the while professing not to like animals!

It’s strange that rinsing my mouth with salt water brought back so many memories of grandma. I would sit at her feet and beg her to tell me “about the old days”. Then when my grandson started asking me to “tell me about when you were young” I realised that we all want to know about the past to understand the present. My brother remembers that she always told us to “look after your eyes”. Sensible advice. My mother always quoted grandma as saying “if everyone put their dirty linen into a big pile then they would take out their own dirty clothes”. So true. We deal with what we are given. She didn’t have much, she didn’t ask for much and she loved us unreservedly and I think I might take up gargling with salt water every day even when my mouth has healed!