grandpa.

grandpa

october 14, 1921 - april 16, 2010

last week, my dear grandpa passed away. he had been in the hospital for just over a week before with complications from pneumonia and alzheimers. he is now in a better place, watching over all of us.

he was a great and wonderful man. the best grandpa you could ever ask for. he worked hard all his life and loved a party. he was a proud world war 2 vet. he was a manager at euclid beach, a local amusement park, which was before my time. he had great stories and i loved to hear them. it made for a fun childhood for my mom and my aunt. he was an avid fisherman, which is what he did for the majority of his retirement years. he was always jolly, greeting you with a big smile and some funny line to give you a laugh. as the alzheimers took over him the last year or so, he still had moments of "pure" grandpa, hard as that was for him, i can only try to imagine. he was a great guy. we all loved him dearly.

i have some great memories of him, and some more were added to my list as my brave sister spoke of some of her favorite memories at his funeral, here are some of many more, in random order.

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he always had time for games, hide n seek, barbies, "dress up" complete with a purse, or a tea party.

i always thought his "watch mark" was so cool, from spending summer days on a boat. that man had a great tan!

kim and i making him sandwiches for his lunch on our friday night sleepovers at their house, for his lunch on the boat the next day.

playing waitress and bringing him his lunch, b/c both kim and i wanted to be waitresses when we grew up.

sitting on the front porch at the "old" house watching baseball on tv.

easter egg hunts

riding around the trailer park (where the "old" house was...a house i loved) on a golf cart

going to the villa angela fairs, playing the birthday game. and when we couldn't win a toy, he would offer to pay the guy for the prize.

getting a dollar for eating all our dinner on fridays.

watching the family of raccoons from the front porch (old house) climb up and down the trees. i loved the babies.

how proud he was of his garden (new house)

when he would bring home something from the "garage" (part of the park where they lived)...one i really remember was a giant ring of old keys. that intrigued me.

sitting on the front porch at the "new" house on summer nights. analyzing why the window in a house across the street was lit all red. (b/c there was a red curtain i figured out)

warm summer nights on the front porch

he gave the best back rubs before bedtime when we were young

my sister was no more than 5 years old, possibly younger, and really wanted a real diamond ring. i knew that was not possible for someone her age, and that she wouldn't get it (i think she wanted it for christmas), but grandpa got her her diamond ring. what she didn't know was that it was a cheap "children's" diamond ring, the kind you adjust to your finger, but he put it inside my mom's engagement ring box. she was so happy to open it and get her ring! i was old enough to be in on the whole deal, and i wondered if she'd believe it was real. he made sure we got what we wanted.

my sister certainly was a character, this other memory involves her too. we went with grammy and grandpa to visit his sisters in pennsylvania sometimes, for a long weekend. his sister had a hair salon in her basement. we would always go down there and play "beauty shop". so of course, grandpa was a "customer" to our shop. kim was "cutting" his hair with the scissors. she accidently cut a chunk of his already very short hair off! he didn't care, he just had a "bald spot" in back for a while!

playing with the dollhouse, and his "person" always had the measles due to the red freckles on the toys face. and he always had them in the corner for being bad!

how he and kim (at 2 yrs. old) would bring me back cups of water (to use on my sandcastle) from the lake at our hotel in disney b/c i was afraid of alligators. i figured let them get bitten! (this is a vague memory, reinforced by video, but i do vaguely remember sitting on the beach while they did this!)

how he helped me in college with a school project....we made instruments for one of my early childhood education classes.

watching the july 4 fireworks just 2 years ago with just grammy and him on the back deck at the house.

how proud he was when kim and i finally took to eating the lake erie perch he caught.....and always asked how many we ate. (it was never enough in his eyes, he'd say, "that's it?!"), to this day it's the only fish i would eat. so i guess i don't eat fish anymore.

always offering his hard candy to me

at shady lake (a mini amusement park he helped run when i was really young), waiting in line for a ride, and him telling the guy who was working it, to let me on even though i didn't have a ticket. i felt so special! i didn't need a ticket to ride like all the other people!

this probably annoyed grammy to no end, but to a little kid it made me laugh. we'd be on the couch or somewhere, and needed a drink, etc. and we would call "grammy" in every voice pitch there was til she came and said "what?!" rather irritated!

in the late nineties, he was hospitalized near the place where i worked, so i would walk over and eat lunch with him during my lunch hour. as much discomfort as he was in then, he always made our lunches enjoyable while he was there.

his favorite color being red. and his love for caps.

this memory i do vaguely remember, but it's reinforced by videos. when kim and i were little, they would let us slide down this old wooden door, set up on an ottoman, or we would jump off the ottoman onto an old couch cushion. i guess i was a talker that day, b/c i was so busy talking or chanting something (video has no sound, and i don't remember talking), my sister would push by me, so grandpa finally made her wait her turn. and also during this, i had a sore arm from some sort of shot i had gotten at the doctor that day, (i remember how stiff my arm felt), and how he gently helped me get up and down during these fun activities, so that my arm wouldn't hurt.

his weekly stops at our house to pick up the cans to go to get recycled.

one time he came over on his way to make his "rounds" near the lake and at the trailer park, he cried to me in the kitchen b/c grammy had fallen (she was ok), and he was so upset. it's the one time i remember him crying. one of the few times i truly saw him sad.

watching him play with the girls i nanny for. they called him "grampy" and was their "local" grandpa that they saw every week (their "real" grandparents are out of state). i enjoyed watching them play together, tea parties, balloon "batting", and laughing at one of their favorite movies, "home alone", and when he was still fishing, he would let them come see the fish they caught, right off the boat. and how he would hold the youngest when she was just a little baby.

watching him in the role of great grandpa with my niece addison. building her "forts" with the blocks, letting her tease him with his cane, and playing with his favorite cap. he was so proud of her, and his role of grandpa, and now great grandpa.

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he was the best. he never got to see me run, as i picked up the habit just a few years ago. i know if he could have come he would have, and would have been the biggest fan i had. now he has a great seat, watching over me now. and i know he was there when i had 3 personal time records last week. i sweat out all my stress and tears with 3 good runs with angel wings helping me.

love you grandpa, and i miss you a lot, but i am glad you are in a better place now, in comfort.