I don’t remember much.
When I was around eight years old my family would go to visit my grandparents every month, usually on a Sunday. We would have ham, or turkey, and I remember the long dirt road hill that we had to drive up to in order to get to their house. A hill that I fell down on and tore a chunk of my knee off – I still have the scar.
I remember the cigars – cheap and sweet and ever-present that Grandpa smoked. He always smelled like those cigars.
I remember the GRIT magazines, that I read every time I visited. Big piles that were in their bedroom, with great stories that helped me learn new worlds and about the world. I remember the Paul Harvey books that I also read.
And I remember the basement with the storage box filed with well-read western novels – classics from Louis Lamour, Zane Grey, and more… A box that he gave me, in one of the last times I saw him. A box I sold on ebay for nearly nothing.
I wish I still had that box.
My grandfather passed away yesterday, after scores of years. I don’t know how many, because I was never close to him. I was never close to him because my father was estranged from him, for reasons I don’t know and will probably never know.
I remember his wife, my grandmother, died almost 20 years ago… I remember him remarrying, and how that caused some frictio and hurt and pain and uncomfortable situations.
And I remember that he never saw his great-grandsons.
I don’t mourn him… I hardly knew him, and what I remember of him was that he was a brusk, closed off man – men were like that, back then. I mourn the opportunity lost, that he did not embrace his family as you are supposed to…
I mourn the wisdom lost.
And I pray that what came between my father and his never happens between me and my sons.
Rest in peace, Howard.