"He was a miserable, sad, and angry man in the last years of his life," said my father on the phone to me last week, speaking about my grandfather, once his father-in-law.
I couldn't fathom why at the time, but his words just didn't ring true with my memories of the man. I remember his smile and how his eyes would become soft slits that curved slightly downward, as if to meet the corners of his mouth that were curving upward and wanting to complete a circle. I remember him taking me everywhere he went and I remember him rolling cigarettes and sharing his tricks with me.
"Wing! Wing!" My parents claimed that I would say that whenever I saw him, from the moment that I could form words, and no matter what time of day or what time of year --bitterly freezing Chicago cold, bundled up in so many layers and a big furry hat; stiflingly hot Chicago heat, stripped down to nothing but a sleeveless undershirt and some lightweight boxers-- rain or snow or sunshine he would take me, always with that smile, out to his backyard to sit together on the old swingset... the one with the two bench seats facing each other. He would sit with me for hours if I asked him. And he never once complained or declined my request for our special time together.
I had many cousins too... around that time there were at least 8 others all clammoring for his attention... but I was definitely his favorite, which made me a target of jealousy in private later. I was the only child of his only daughter, who was a daddy's girl herself. I was a golden child and could do no wrong as far as he was concerned. And I felt that I could do no wrong when I was with him. That I was perfect just for being me.
I remember when he was visiting us once in 1977, and I had come running home from school, because I knew my grandparents were supposed to be there. But in my excitement to get home, I forgot to use a restroom and hadn't used one all day. By the time I reached my house on my long walk home, I was in so much pain, I couldn't hold it any longer... and the warm liquid streamed down my legs with each step I took up our stairs to the porch. By the time I reached the top, my pants and shoes were soaked and I was a sobbing mess. I imagined the reprimands that I would be getting from my father about being so foolish as to forget to go all day, and the shaming look in my mother's eye as she would help me change.
Instead of either of my parents coming to let me in that day, it was my grandfather who came to the door to greet me. Seeing me shaking and sobbing, he looked down at my wet clothes and the puddle streaming from my shoes and said sweetly, with that same warm smile, "It's okay. I have accidents too sometimes." He brought me inside, helped me get changed, and never once told either of my parents about it.
Later that same year, I woke up in the middle of the night hearing a woman crying... wailing was more like it. I thought someone had left the television on, until I got up to investigate and found it was coming from my parents bedroom. I walked in to see both of them up and my mother crying uncontrollably. I hadn't yet reached my seventh birthday, but I understood in that instant that something had happened to my grandfather. They said he died of a heart attack in the bathroom of his home just a few hours earlier.
I remember his wake and the three days I spent looking at him in his coffin and wondering who would sit with me on the swingset now. When we would go back to my grandparents' house in the evenings, I tried to get my own father to sit with me, but he was distracted. And my mother couldn't bring herself to sitting in her dad's spot. So I sat on the swing alone each day and stared at the spot where he used to be. The next summer that old swingset was taken down. My uncle said it was falling apart and wasps were building nests in it. Just the summer before it seemed perfectly fine, like it would be around forever. Then again, so did my grandfather.
So when my father was saying those words to me last week, telling me how he remembers my grandfather being miserable and angry and sad in his last years of life, I couldn't fathom it. He would never fit that description in my mind.
That night, I decided to watch the first of several videos that I'd rented for the week. It was EVERYTHING IS ILLUMINATED. For some reason, I kept pausing the movie and getting distracted by other things and couldn't concentrate on just watching the movie. The next day, I was headed to the gym, when I remembered that the movie was still on pause. So I decided that maybe I could watch a few more minutes of it before heading out. I had no idea that I would never make it to the gym that day, or what kind of cathartic experience awaited me in that moment.
I don't wish to ruin the movie for those of you who haven't seen it... and if you haven't, you should... but there is a scene, after this long, bizarre, seemingly pointless search, where everything comes together. Why everyone in that moment is there... why a collector from the US would be standing on the porch of an old woman in the Ukrain he wasn't even related to, in the middle of a sunflower field at night, searching for another woman in a photograph with his grandfather, and being given her wedding ring that he didn't think was his since he wasn't related to her, saved first by burial in the ground to keep from the Nazis, then carefully dug up by her sister and kept in a box marked "in case" and for over half a century. He was meant to have that ring, because it hadn't been saved "in case" something happened to the woman who wore it, but "in case" he existed... and that he existed because the ring was waiting to be found by someone just like him... it was the reason for his whole being at that moment... for why he was who he was.
The tears started rolling down my cheeks. My father's words about my grandfather made sense finally. My grandfather may have been sad or miserable to some people in his later years, but I existed for the sole purpose of bringing him moments of pure happiness and unconditional love for a few short years.
I smiled as the tears ran down my cheeks, as I am now, knowing how good those years felt and how cherished those memories are to me. There have been only a few memories in my life that come near to those, and sometimes I wondered what I might have turned out like if he'd been around longer to share that smile of his with me, but I'm grateful for the moments that I had.
Although seven years can feel like a lifetime when you're feeling constantly misunderstood, it can also feel like a blink of an eye when you're unconditionally accepted. Sometimes I dream of that swingset and the two of us there, like I did last night, warmed by the crinkle of his eyes and the curve of his smile. It's hard to leave that dream, but I know that I will have this same kind of moment again one day. Someone else might cherish that blissfully quiet contentment on the swing as much as I do... no words needed... just a smile.
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