It is like my mom to be drama free to the extent that she didn't let me know my grandpa is dying until she had to notify me that our family picture day tomorrow is cancelled-- because grandpa is dying. Actually, she didn't even tell me that much. Family pictures were being cancelled because grandpa wasn't well. When I inquired further, she mentioned he might not make it through the night.
I was raised by a very practical, down to earth, common sense, hard working woman who came by these traits in a childhood with no room for anything but farm chores alongside her father, my grandpa. You won't find farmers blowing things out of proportion or feeling sorry for themselves, at least not in my family.
So I take the news of my grandpa in a similar vein, as if I've been told tomorrow's no good for planting because a storm's rolling in. But there's a part of me that was never weeded out no matter how sternly emotion was frowned upon and this part of me is trying not to freak out. The tough part of me is very well developed, though, after a childhood full of mom, and I'm not about to write the mush that will trigger the tears I'm holding back.
Instead, I'll just inform you that I grew up in the same small town as my grandpa; he was at my house as often as I was at his. When I spent the night with him I got to go "chorin'" with him in the mornings, and I slept in his shirts. Some children aren't lucky enough to have grandpas who are good and whom they get to see with regularity. I was.
There aren't many old time Missourians like my grandpa anymore, with his distinctive way of speaking and an ornery sense of humor; his spirit, attitude and character formed by an earlier time, a lifetime of hard work and simple living. As an adult I've many times reflected on this and wished I could preserve the piece of history and the goodness that grandpa is. But isn't it amazing easily the distractive hustle of the adult life keeps you from doing what you dearly wished to?
I keep the tears in check knowing that he knows and has known how much I loved him despite not being an emotionally expressive family. He loved me, too, and I know that. And no matter how much time I'd spent with him I'd still be sitting here wishing I had more.
