It’s a little eerie to hear the cold wind whistle outside your kitchen door when you get the word that your grandfather has finally died.
Then again, if you had known my grandfather and the state he’s been in for uncountable years you’d probably think, with me, that he’s been dead for a long time – his heart just hadn’t stopped yet.
The wonderful thing is that now we won’t have to face the reality of a blasted body and we can instead begin to create a memorial in our minds to the whole of the man. He and my grandmother were married for more than 60 years. They had six children and eleven grandchildren. He served in World War II and worked hard after the war in a variety of respectable jobs. He always put food on the table and, even if he was unpleasantly gruff from time to time, he genuinely loved his family.
If his only monument is our large, loud, happily scrapping family it’s still the best monument to any person I can think of.
One by one the older generations pass away, leaving us only memories as a tenuous link to the distant past. We’re all patients in the terminal ward but knowing the fact doesn’t make it any less difficult when one or another of us slips away.
Oh well. C’est la vie. Here’s to grandpop: Edward Hagarty, Sr. May you rest in peace; you have certainly earned it.
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