King of the Road
I got into a conversation with my cousin tonight about our Grandfather. She had the fortune to live with him for a while, and was telling me about the kind of music he would listen to during dinner. I always knew Louis Armstrong was one of his favorites, due to a 6" tall figurine of the man himself that was always displayed in the living room of casa grandparents. But I never knew he loved Johnny Cash or Roger Miller quite as much as he apparently did. I suppose it would have been nice to sit around a bottle of wine with my grandpa and listen to any of the above...which is as close to missing him as I've come in a long time.
I wonder if he would be proud of me as I'm living my life as I know it now. I wonder what we would talk about with a few whiskeys in us and a spare moment during a family gathering. He died before I was old enough to know what I was missing with him leaving so soon. And now all we have are these memories and assumptions of a man who lived a life that we'll never have explained in retrospect from the one who lived it looking back upon the years past.
I remember him as very stylish. He would laugh about my sister and Mom and I traveling around, calling us gypsies. All of us grandkids were turkeys - he was aloof enough to be able to pass us all off as such but not so much that he wouldn't take us into his lap for a few minutes of quality time with the gramps. I think he enjoyed being a grandfather more than a father, which must have been interesting to watch from my mother or grandmother's perspective.
He was a player, I remember meeting his secretary - who I later found out was one of many mistresses he kept throughout his life. I can't figure him out - and really have no tools for doing so. I'm not one for dwelling on things that can't change, but it's compelling to think about how my life would be different if my grandfather hadn't died in the early 90's.
I do know that he drove across country to meet up with my grandmother and cousins when they all moved in with us back in the day. Pretty sure it was them being broke and needing a place to live while grampy died. What I wouldn't give to know what was going through his head when he drove from Connecticut to California during that trip. He obviously knew he was going to die, leaving a few daughters and 6 grandkids, not to mention his wife and perhaps a mistress along the way. Did he stop for a drink somewhere and talk to a bartender about it? He took the Buick, was always very intent on keeping that symbol of 1950's American success along with him. Did he chain-smoke the entire way, all the while hoping that the cancer would be quick and kind? Was he angry at the end? Tired? Was he ready to die or did he fight to try and keep going?
I know I'll never know him in the way that I know anyone now that I trust my powers of first impression. But perhaps I'll find him at the end of a Johnny Cash song.
I wonder if he would be proud of me as I'm living my life as I know it now. I wonder what we would talk about with a few whiskeys in us and a spare moment during a family gathering. He died before I was old enough to know what I was missing with him leaving so soon. And now all we have are these memories and assumptions of a man who lived a life that we'll never have explained in retrospect from the one who lived it looking back upon the years past.
I remember him as very stylish. He would laugh about my sister and Mom and I traveling around, calling us gypsies. All of us grandkids were turkeys - he was aloof enough to be able to pass us all off as such but not so much that he wouldn't take us into his lap for a few minutes of quality time with the gramps. I think he enjoyed being a grandfather more than a father, which must have been interesting to watch from my mother or grandmother's perspective.
He was a player, I remember meeting his secretary - who I later found out was one of many mistresses he kept throughout his life. I can't figure him out - and really have no tools for doing so. I'm not one for dwelling on things that can't change, but it's compelling to think about how my life would be different if my grandfather hadn't died in the early 90's.
I do know that he drove across country to meet up with my grandmother and cousins when they all moved in with us back in the day. Pretty sure it was them being broke and needing a place to live while grampy died. What I wouldn't give to know what was going through his head when he drove from Connecticut to California during that trip. He obviously knew he was going to die, leaving a few daughters and 6 grandkids, not to mention his wife and perhaps a mistress along the way. Did he stop for a drink somewhere and talk to a bartender about it? He took the Buick, was always very intent on keeping that symbol of 1950's American success along with him. Did he chain-smoke the entire way, all the while hoping that the cancer would be quick and kind? Was he angry at the end? Tired? Was he ready to die or did he fight to try and keep going?
I know I'll never know him in the way that I know anyone now that I trust my powers of first impression. But perhaps I'll find him at the end of a Johnny Cash song.
posted by Black Sheep Girl at 11:08 PM
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