Twenty-four years ago today, my maternal grandfather died after a struggle with lung cancer. The smoking habit that he had acquired during WWII had long been given up, but the non-filtered Camels he favored during his stint overseas had done their damage. I was 11 years old, and he was only in his mid-70s.
I don't remember much about my grandpa, but at least I got to know him a little bit -- my youngest siblings never even got to meet him. He's just a picture to them. What I do remember is that he had a thick head of curly white hair up until the chemo took that away from him. (My uncle has that same head of hair, minus the "white" part.) I also remember that my grandpa did the dishes for my grandma after every meal -- without prompting. And in the summers when my brother and cousins spent a week visiting with them, grandpa always made blueberry pancakes for breakfast at least once as a treat for his grand kids. It was, my grandma said, the only meal he ever mastered.
My grandpa was the first person I ever knew to buy a diesel car -- a huge boat of a late '70s station wagon, white with a faux-wood stripe down each side. I remember riding shotgun with him to a neighboring town on a shopping errand for my grandma, and having him point out local landmarks to me along the way. Riding shotgun was a big deal back then, but having him all to myself was even better.
Grandpa was a veteran, but he didn't talk too much about the war. He told me a bit about it, mainly because I was the only grand kid who was old enough to ask about or be interested in his experiences. I have the insignia to his uniform in my jewelry box. I found it in my grandma's jewelry box after she died, and pocketed it before anyone could throw it out. I remember him telling me that he was stationed near the front, but only in an administrative capacity. He had bad vision (and glasses), so the higher ups wouldn't let him join the infantry. It's a good thing, too -- he managed to break his glasses at least twice during his tour overseas, and had to write home for replacements.
My grandma met my grandpa on a blind date, just a few weeks before he was scheduled to leave for Europe. She was in her mid 30s then -- older than the average single gal, but still at home to take care of her younger siblings and sick mother. I wonder sometimes if she worried about her future, or was envious of her married friends. But according to grandma, she fell in love the minute she set eyes on my grandpa. Grandpa later told her that he had made up his mind to marry her when he saw her sitting on her mother's porch. He proposed one week later, and they were married in her parent's living room three weeks after their first date. My great grandma cried during the entire ceremony, mainly because her Catholic daughter had decided to marry a heathen of a Lutheran. (Oddly enough, it was my grandpa who later made all of his kids go to Catholic Sunday school and my grandma who would let them skip this weekly obligation.) Grandma wore a green velvet suit with a giant corsage for the ceremony, and grandpa wore his army uniform. In the picture a friend took of them after they said their vows, she is radiant -- and he can't take her eyes off of her.
My grandma had always wanted to be a writer. A "real" writer. So she practiced by writing long letters to grandpa during his tour of duty, but more often than not, she wrote him poetry. Poetry about how much she missed him, poetry about day-to-day things, humorous poetry to cheer him up. Grandpa would pay his more literary army buddies to write poems that he then mailed back to her. I have that correspondence now. I took the fat envelope of yellowing letters from her top dresser drawer a year before she died, at her request. She wanted them to live on in someone's memory.
Grandpa was a gardener, but I don't really remember working in the garden with him. It was a pretty good-sized garden for two people to have, and he spent a lot of time puttering around in it. I do remember helping weed it during a few of my summer visits, and shelling peas in the cool garage next to his work bench after he picked a basket of them. Grandma always had a garden, even after grandpa died. She even planted a patch of rhubarb in his memory -- his favorite pie was strawberry rhubarb pie. The funny thing though, was that Grandma hated rhubarb. But not as much as she hated grandpa's experimental bottles of dandelion wine.
My grandma and grandpa spent the winter months in Florida, so that grandpa could avoid the harsh winter air. They had a crew of snow bird friends down there, and bought a trailer next to my grandma's younger brother Roy. Roy lived in Florida year round, and would great my grandparent's annual fall arrival with an expansive smile and the same greeting year after year: "Welcome to Utopia!" Grandma and grandpa did come home for Christmas, though, to visit with the grand kids and to deliver bags of fresh grapefruit for our holiday brunch.
I don't remember when my grandpa was diagnosed with cancer. But I remember that he was suddenly very sick, and seemed suddenly very fragile. For some reason I can no longer remember, I was sent to stay with my grandma for a week to help her take care of grandpa. He had started chemotherapy and was not feeling well. I remember that my grandma helped him take a bath one morning and then asked me to dry his hair. He sat in his old brown chair and patiently let me blow dry and comb out his curls. But that day, his hair began coming out in clumps. I remember that it was this loss that finally made my grandma break down and cry.
The day before he died, we all gathered at my grandparent's house. The adults headed to the hospital to be with grandpa, but my aunt stayed behind to babysit the younger crowd. She decided to keep us occupied and make dinner -- meatloaf and mashed potatoes -- for the entire family at the same time, so we were all given jobs. Peel the potatoes, chop the onions, measure out the ketchup, mix up the beef, cut up tomatoes for the salad. My grandpa died while we were cooking that dinner -- I remember my aunt answering the phone and then telling us all that our grandpa was gone. I don't think we finished cooking that meal, or that we even ate that night.
My grandpa asked for me while he was in the hospital, but I was too scared to visit him. I was the only grand kid old enough to be admitted during visiting hours, but I was too scared to see him in a hospital bed or even worse, without his hair. My mom and dad never forced the issue with me, so I didn't see grandpa before he passed away. This is something that I always will regret. He asked, and I didn't go. I was his first grand child -- and an adopted grand child at that. My parents waited four years to adopt me, and my grand parents were very much involved in the process. Grandpa doted on me. I still have a picture of him holding me minutes after I came home from the adoption agency, and he is beaming.
My grandma lived for 15 more years after grandpa died. We moved her from the home they had made together to a smaller house, where she would be closer to the rest of her family. She made friends, found a church, gardened, welcomed new grandchildren into the family, celebrated birthdays and weddings, and even got to meet three of her great grandchildren -- The Beavis, and my cousin's two children. I remember that she came to take care of me after The Beavis was born, and wouldn't let me climb the stairs to get him after his naps. Instead, she made the trek up and down herself, calming her crying grand baby all the way. When he learned to talk, The Beavis would refer to her as "great grandma." This always made her laugh, especially when she replied: "Why, hello to you, Charlie," and he angrily insisted ( with a lot of foot stomping) that his name was NOT Charlie.
My grandma eventually outlived her oldest son -- her middle child. I'm sure this was almost worse than burying her husband. She grew frail and isolated, but insisted on staying in her home. She eventually fell down the steps and broke her hip. The doctors suggested admitting her to an assisted living facility and selling her house, because she was never going to be able to live alone again. Grandma staged a hunger strike in response. My grandpa was with her as she died -- or, at least, she thought he was there. She carried on long conversations with him in the end, and quietly slipped away during one of them.
We didn't celebrate the Fourth of July the year my grandpa died. And we didn't celebrate it for many years after that. Instead, we would take my grandma to the cemetery and then get together as a family for a simple meal. At some point, we did start celebrating the holiday with bigger barbeques and more guests -- but I can't remember when or who decided that it was okay to move on.
Some years I don't really think about my grandpa dying on the Fourth of July, but other years it really bugs me. This year is a "really bugs me" year, and I don't know why. I think it has something to do with watching my parents get older and physically age -- a phenomenon that I didn't really notice until the last few years. Maybe it's simply me getting older. Maybe it's hormones...or a combination of all three. But this year just seems a little bit lonelier celebrating the Fourth of July without the folks I used to see at our family cook outs.
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