Wednesday, January 19, 2011

I'm not good at





I m not good at a lot of things and I'm okay with that. I'm not good at lying to my husband, I'm not good at being patient and my math skills are less then stellar.

But I am really not good at saying good bye. I'm not good with grief. I don't know how to handle it, I cry for a few minutes and then I'm done. I move on.

My Grandfather died yesterday, and now I'm trying to figure how to grieve this complicated man. He was a great artist, a husband, a father to ten children and grandfather to more then 30. When I was a baby he gave me a stuffed Panda Bear named "Papa Bear" that stayed on my bed until I was 12 or 13.

I don't know a lot about my Grandfather, I didn't know him well. He always lived far away and never really came to family reunions after he and my Granny divorced. I guess you could say that he had a complicated relationship with my Dad which got better after my Dad moved back to Oklahoma.I don't know what his favorite color was, or what his favorite song was, we never celebrated a Birthday party together nor was he at my wedding. But he was this mythical figure who I'm glad I got to know better over these last years.

But I do know that he was a talented artist, who worked as long as he could. He was a fighter who according to my Dad was supposed to "die from cancer in 1992", he accomplished much he was the illustrator for the "Friend" way back when it was called "The Children's Friend." He loved us all in his way .

The last time we went to see him my Father made a commit about all of the great work that he had done. "Well I only made 10 things that were any good." one of those 10 things lead to me, and that is something that I am grateful for.

I'm not very good at grieving but I'm good at loving and remembering and believing. I loved my Grandfather, and I will do my best to honor him and remember him, and I believe that I will see him again and sit at his knee again.

2 comments:

  1. So sorry Whit! I lost my grandma almost a year ago and then a few months later my grandpa followed her. It's a hard time. Let me know if you need anything...a hug, anything!

    ReplyDelete
  2. That is really sweet. And you hit the nail on the head, it's not the tears you cry, but the memory you honor and love you feel.

    ReplyDelete