I sat with the biggest, baddest, ugliest of beasts tonight. Cancer. It has been slowly tearing away at the body of a kind, gentle man I called “Grandpa.” He married my Grandma in 1977, after my dad’s dad had died from lung cancer. Grandpa was a small town kid that grew up to be a small town old-timer. He worked at the grain elevator and smoked cigars for more years than I’ve been alive. He would come home for lunch with the noon whistle echoing through the village of Otoe. When he wasn’t at work, we would find him in his chair in the southwest corner of the living room, keeping tabs on Husker and Viking football. This afternoon when I got to my grandparent’s home, there he was, in the southwest corner of the room, lying in a hospital bed, specially adorned with flannel sheets to make it seem more like the bed he’d become accustomed to while married to my grandma.
I don’t know of anything worse than sitting there, watching time drift by in the face of someone who can barely breath, let alone take care of themselves. Everything got worse, the breathing, the weight loss, after they told him the words that no person should have to hear or say: We’ve tried everything. The beast has now taken over his whole body. What used to be a potbelly full of laughter now contains demonic tentacles stretching into all areas of his body. And there is nothing that humans can physically do to stop its onslaught.
While this picture will not be the one that we most remember from my grandpa’s life, the image will always be with me. I’ll never forget the last time I saw my maternal grandma: sitting in the same chair she’d sat in for more moons than many of us have seen, waiting for leukemia to take her to heaven. As I see my paternal grandpa struggling against the unforgiving beast, the small smile I can create comes from hoping grandpa is comfortable in his familiar spot in the house.
It has been an especially tough year for my family: My aunt was buried after being hit by a drunk driver the same week, albeit 20 years later, as her dad succumbed to lung cancer. Now, with my grandparent’s 25th anniversary and Grandpa’s 73rd birthday coming, we wait again for God to call another one of our family members home.
As a wise man once said, “It’s times like these you learn to live again.” It’s also times like these that you realize what is truly important in your life. The paper I’m supposed to be writing for grad school can be put off one more day while I deal with the emotions flowing through my mind. Nothing is more important than your family. Whether you love them or hate them, most of us wouldn’t be where we are today without the love, support, and understanding. My grandparents were always around while my parents were divorced, and even after, hauling me wherever I needed to go. They did what all grandparents are supposed to do: go to games, give too many presents, spoil us rotten. But they always commanded respect. Once I cleared my Catholic conversion with my dad, they were the second people I garnered an opinion from. They said what I was raised to believe: We don’t care who you worship God with, just as long as you do. Again, your beliefs and ideals come from your family.
I’ve extremely proud and fortunate to be a part of my family. The tree of my life would not be growing as quickly and beautifully as it has without the roots that my family helped me to plant.
Whether you like your family or not, love them. Learn from them. Whether they teach you what to do or what not to do, God put them with you for a reason.
Cherish the times that you have with the ones that you hold close to your heart.
