Let me tell you about a man...

 “To take each moment, and live each moment…let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me.”  

Let me tell you about a man who brought peace to my earth.

My grandfather was a man of simple means.  He lived for days spent with his family, took pride in his job and used his spare time to help others.  He spent his working life as a corrugated box salesman, engineering boxes (and, as he would say, from corrugated fiber-board, not cardboard).  His packaging needed to protect the product so that it could safely get to its destination.  He valued his clients needs and wished to convey that in the way he protected their product.  After his retirement from J&J Corrugated Box Co., my grandfather volunteered at Perkins’ Institute for the Blind. He spent his volunteer time assisting to make manipulatives to suit the various needs of students attending Perkins.  Once again, his box-engineering skills came in handy, this time helping to provide learning accommodations to children.

Left fatherless at the tender age of two, my grandfather, one of thirteen children, had several older brothers that were able to fill the role of “father figure”.  He had many stories of his childhood.  All of which I enjoyed hearing him tell repeatedly.  One of my favorites, an itemized list of what he would find in his yearly Christmas stockings, always sounded magical to me.  Hearing him tick off each treat, item by item was to witness him reliving the joy of those boyhood days.  I remember marveling how getting an orange or two at Christmas was special...because in the 1980’s we had them all the time.

As I grew, and attended elementary school, my grandfather would take my brother and I to Toys R Us for good report cards.  My mother insisted that he keep a $10.00 limit for both of us.  Once at the store, one of us would inevitably select something before looking to see that it was slightly over the maximum.  He usually played by the rules and redirected our eyes to something within range.  But maybe, just maybe once or twice, we may have been a dollar over.

Fast forward a bit to my high school years and I am wearing a back brace to treat scoliosis.  For two years I had to wear that brace for 16 hours a day.  For this reason, I needed to be picked up from school in order to get home in time to put it on.  My grandfather picked me up on his designated days to get me home in time, but not before stopping at Friendly’s for ice cream.  Now, at this point in my life I wish I could remember what we talked about.  However, it’s the feeling of sitting across the table from him, eating ice cream, that still warms me now.

Spring ahead still further, and married with my own children, my grandfather would prepare dinner every Sunday.   We would go to visit with my mother and because of this, my grandparents, too.  The rotation of menu items was always pretty reliable, too.  As the time approached to return home to prepare for another work/school week, I am pretty sure he always strategically asked if our boys wanted an apple, cut-up.  They always said yes, and it always kept us there a little longer.  Only then while they were eating their cut-up apples would he say, “Bag Night!” and produce a bag with snacks for the school week. We ended up with so many bags of goldfish at one time, that I would end up bringing bags of goldfish to my students at school.  His snacks purchased were provided to many.

While there was not a thing that my grandfather wasn’t interested in talking about, it was his interest in what the kids had to say that I have always admired.  Infant, adolescent, or teen, he was all ears.  Infant crying? He listened.  My grandfather would walk that baby around until either they were happy and smiling because he had appeased their boredom, or they were found sleeping in his arms because the rhythm of his walk and hum had acquiesced their fight to stay awake.  Adolescents could always find him interested in the games they were playing.  He was ever open to allowing kids the ability to explore, whether it was creating rivers with the hose in a pile of sand or listening to them belt out tunes on a keyboard or guitar, for example.  I think of him fondly as a pied-piper of sorts; at any family gathering, they simply just gravitated to him.  Children, one and all, felt his genuine love.

His unconditional love spanned his lifetime.  As a father, a grandfather, a great-grandfather, a friend, volunteer and community member.  What I didn’t know as a child, I realized as an adult.  It was his sense of wonder that I admired all those years.  His ability to value his conversations with children just as much, if not even more so, than those with adults.  And, no matter what age he was, he was never “too old” to play.

One of the last things I was able to do with my grandfather this summer was play “Go Fish”.  Because of the dementia he no longer remembered that he had been an avid card player throughout his life.  Often getting together with extended and immediate family alike for game nights,  with cribbage and pitch being some of his favorites.  He never knew that I always watched him shuffle and cut the cards with awe: He was so fast and the cards blended together so crisply. But, on that day, I had to teach my grandfather how to “Go Fish”.  As I fumbled to shuffle the cards with lone cards falling out of the stack, he marveled at how I did it, “Wow, you’re good at that”....I had to pause, take a breath, and thank him.  Even at that point in his sickness, knowing he no longer knew me as his granddaughter, his supportive nature rallied on. 

That single phrase in that moment reminded me of the pride and love I have felt from him all the years of my life.  We played through the game as best we could, with me letting him win.  Upon winning, he gave “the” smile and a chuckle.  The smile that I only ever associated with love and genuine joy.  The very same smile that could light up a room of people.  It was the same one used to greet friends, family and strangers, alike. It lit up his eyes, as he would extend his hand in greeting to those he first met or was seeing again after some time.  It was contagious. Because of it’s sincerity I don’t think there was anyone who didn’t feel that he valued them.

These are just a few memories of mine.  His presence in my life has been a veritable axis for 43 years. Through his actions and the way he lived his life, he has modeled that the energy one uses to sow discord is just as easily done to sow peace.  And, he did so as a man of simple needs, who lived for days spent with his family. He understood that the ability to project peace, faith, forgiveness, support, and love just to name a few, were all powered by one’s ability to smile and mean it. He lived each moment of his life as a joyful participant, ever thankful to have had the chance to play.