A Celebration

I came home from spinning class this morning excited to wish my now 6 year old girl a Happy Birthday. We got a call soon after telling us that my grandfather, my father's father, passed away in his sleep last night. He was 97. He joins his wife who passed away in 2001.

I have been thinking about some of my memories of my grandpa. The first thing that comes to mind when I think of my grandpa is his laugh. I can see and hear it my mind. It was a quick loud robust laugh that would fade as he ran out of air laughing. There were the summers eating cherries off their tree in the backyard, the time when I was about 13 that my older sister and I got to stay with my grandparents for a week (we stayed up late playing a card game when we were supposed to be sleeping). Grandpa joined the single men at my wedding reception and tried to catch the garter which was fun for everyone to watch. My grandfather served in WWII. He was a part of 7 invasions including D-Day. My cousin Shirley and I video taped an interview we did of him the summer before I got married. We asked him about his war experiences. He was emotional as he talked about them, about visiting the concentration camps and seeing the cruelty of the Nazis, of coming home on the ship and how almost every man wept, tears running down their cheeks as they saw the Statue of Liberty.

What I had not seen was the rest of the video that my cousin finished taping at a later date. On there was a message to me- right before my wedding. My grandfather told me he loved me and that he hoped I would be as happy as he and Naomi, my grandmother, were. And that he hoped we would have 6 or 7 kids.

My cousin asked toward the end of the video what he would say to Grandma when he saw her next (she had already passed away at the time of taping). He said when he saw her next he would say "Naomi, I'm so glad to see you." I am sure she was happy to see him too!