Life is an odd thing. We are all stricken with the knowledge that we, our parents, children friends and every pet we ever had would one day die – even imaginary friends and pets. There are days in all our lives when we change, we grow. These are days that affect us deeper than we may ever know. Something as simple as “there is no Santa Claus”…Easter bunny, tooth fairy…and yes young one – your Grandpa is gone, and won’t ever again come back. There is a day, and I don’t know what that day was for me that as a human I knew that I was in fact human…and yes; I was going to die.
I will never forget my grandfather’s funeral. I was homeless at the time – but often with friends. I was at a friend’s house, the day after a party. All my life I never drank or did drugs, I was the sober one at the party, and often the last to sleep. I woke up and had to go, there was something deep in me that told me that I had to go see my grandfather. He at the time was in a nursing home, one that was infamous for mistreating their residents. I had to go that day, and asked for a ride from a girl that I knew. I asked that she drop me off where he was at. Thankfully she did.
I walked into the home and walked down the hall towards his room. There is a smell, a smell worse than that of rotting flesh at a wound clinic. The smell is that of the dieing, shit, piss, vomit, cleaner, hair products, flowers, perfume, floor wax, lunch from the cafeteria, sheets, IV’s and on and on. Mix them all and they have a smell, the smell that all nursing homes have. The smell was to me on this day as pungent as the scent of a perfume counter at Macys. I am honestly not sure what was different about this day, I had to come…had to. I walked into his room, a room that he had been in for about eight months. He was a lively one, my grandfather. Always winking at the nurses, the occasional pinch on their rear…forever a smile on his face. This was a man who fought in WWII in the Pacific, after the war working and then retiring from the US Post Office. He had two daughters, one my mother…and was always well dressed, ironed and pressed, looking as if there was a very important meeting in just a couple minutes or so. In retirement he owned a marina on a lake in Wisconsin near Madison. As a child we would spend summers there fishing for crappies and watching sunsets. He was quite a success, I was so proud of him.
Somewhere along the lines he lost his right middle finger. Were there ever stories about how that was lost. Some of flipping off the wrong person, others about picking his nose, lost it in the war, a woman, a machine, working on a car, a tank, a plane and even taking the hook out of a fish’s mouth. I will never forget the time that as I was young he was trying to teach me to count to ten with only nine fingers. I am not sure what he thought about that day…but that day meant allot to me.
Walking into his room I saw his coat, he would never go out with out a coat, not even in a nursing home. I saw pictures of my mother and aunt, sister, brothers, cousins. His bed had neither sheets, nor pillows on it. I knew something was wrong at that point. I knew what happened, deep in my heart. I could not feel my feet as I walked to the nurse’s desk. I can not remember the walk, the smell was gone. I got to the nurses desk and could feel my body shaking. I could not speak, for the first time in my life I could not speak. I finally got out “where is he” and pointed to his room. I at that time was praying that he was at lunch, at my moms, anywhere just out of the room. The nurse, a woman who was about three hundred pounds wearing scrubs and quite obviously suffering from an inability to really care informed me that “he expired a couple hours ago” and added with a “who are you”. Not ever once bothering to look at me.
The party the night before was a good one. I had gotten laid by a girl I never knew her name…well; I guess I did know her name for a short while. I felt special and wanted. For many kids in foster homes feeling wanted is more important than eating. Another girl who I had always had a crush on drove me to see my grandfather. There she was, something told her not to leave. I did not know what her plans were, for some reason she came in and was sitting in the entry area of the nursing home. She saw me come out of the room and talk to the nurse, she knew.
We drove silently back to her house. Her parents were gone until later that afternoon…we walked in with out a word. I went to the stereo and put in a Jane’s Addiction CD and listened to Summertime Rolls. I don’t know that I have ever cried that hard. I had not cried a long time before that day, or after that day for that matter. Here I was homeless, penniless and now with out the one man that I thought I could trust in life.
That night I slept in a boat that was abandoned in a field. I would wake up every now and again and stare at the stars, long enough to notice them move across the sky. I must have cried for hours that night. I could not believe what had happened to my life, sleeping in an abandoned boat. I remember the sun burning my eyes as it rose, dew wetting my body and the vinyl seats in the boat. Shivering in the damp of the dawn I got out of the boat and started to walk about six miles to a friend’s house. My friend was not home, his mother however let me borrow a suit and tie. She drove me to the funeral home.
I got to the funeral home about two hours early and walked in. None of my family was there – no one was there. It was about ninety degrees out and I was in all black, pacing down the road. When I noticed that people where at the funeral home I went in…they let me see his body. I could not cry. When people started to come in I went to a hidden area of the funeral home. I never knew before that day that there were rules to a funeral. Family sits in one area, friends in another. I saw my mother, aunt, sister, brothers and other family members there. My brothers did not even recognize me; my sister could not even believe I was there. My mother and aunt were arguing over who loved him more – my aunt’s flowers were bigger so she must have, or so she thought.
Family sat on the left, friends in the center…I sat, on my own – to the right on a couch. A man who never even met my grandfather gave the eulogy. All were invited to my aunts after the funeral, my mother was sure to tell me I was not invited. I walked that day in the sun back to my friends, returned the suit wet with sweat and got my worn clothing back – cleaned thankfully.
I slept that night again…in a boat, in a field that is now a shopping center.