My grandmother, Nanny Nancy, is 99 and going strong. But it can’t be denied that while she’s all there mentally, physically she’s not the lithe young thing she was in her 1920s adolescence. I mean no disrespect to my beloved grandmother, but if we’re honest, when Michael Bay is casting his next blockbuster and it’s a choice between her and Megan Fox for the female lead, well… .
It’s not just me who has noticed this: the kids have even more so. When they were younger, especially, and I asked them to kiss their great-grandmother they’d react — as so many children do when confronting their older relatives’ decrepitude — as if I’d invited them to snog a bird-eating spider.
‘Kids, try to make it less obvious, would you?’ I’d say. ‘You might get more money next time.’ And sure enough, little by little, over the years, my kids have learned the art of what some might call hypocrisy but which I would call basic good manners. They have learned that sometimes to make loved ones happy it is necessary to put your own feelings to one side.
But apparently I’ve been sending the wrong message. You may have read about it in the papers the other day: someone called Lucy Emmerson from something called the Sex Education Forum intimated that forcing kids to kiss granny is akin to setting them up as future rapists and rape victims.
‘I believe learning about consent starts from age zero,’ Emmerson said. ‘Intervening may be awkward… but it is necessary if we are truly to teach children that their bodies are their own and that their instincts should be followed. Suggesting alternatives to the child such as a high-five, a hug, blowing a kiss or a wave puts the child in control.
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