Archive for August, 2006
granddad and me. 1973.
I guess I’ve waited long enough on this. My grandfather passed away in June. Those of you who know my family know how important he was to us, and to me, and how much of him I see in myself. I can’t do him justice so I will keep this short.
Granddad’s life was everything any of us could ask for. He was married for 65 years. He ran a successful family business — selling educational foreign language materials, many of which he photographed, printed, and produced himself. He did a ton of community work, including a few terms as mayor of his village. (here’s a great article from his local paper.) He saw his grandsons graduate college and grow up. He met his great-grandson, saw him learn to walk.
Grandmother can’t live by herself, so I spent a week helping my dad take apart his parents’ house to prep it for sale. Fifty years of family history, memories, life stuff. Which of these paintings is important? Who’s going to take the dining room table? Holy crap, do you remember these photos? What do we do with a wall full of antique clocks? Does Grandmother want these books too? It was exhausting and amazing.
When we were finished, we sat down in the living room where we both grew up and poured two glasses of Granddad’s scotch.
How do you sum up 85 years? All that time at work, all that effort put into the house, all that stress over the kids, the money, the doctors. All the gifts with handmade cards, all the photos, all the advice. All the errands and todo lists and record keeping. We didn’t even try to sum it up, we just raised a glass: thank you for everything, Granddad.
Now a couple of months later, I’m sitting in my house, waiting for our second son to be born. He’ll be here any day now.
When my father died, it was like a whole library had burned down. -Laurie Anderson