Granddaddy’s Gone

Paul Bowers

I read an intriguing book in the back seat of our Toyota Sienna minivan as we rode down the unchanging Interstate. My family was on the way to Florida to visit my Dad’s parents, known to my little brother and me as Nanny and Granddaddy. Occasionally, my mind drifted and I thought about Granddaddy. He hadn’t been doing too well lately and I knew he didn’t have much longer to live. Everyone was surprised he’d lived as long as he already had. Every time I thought about it, I pushed it aside and tried my best to focus on the book.

After the long, boring trip, we finally arrived at Nanny and Granddaddy’s house. I found it difficult to talk to Granddaddy, who had to stay in bed, attached to a breathing machine all day. I could only stand to stay in the same room with him for about five minutes at a time, which seemed like hours. I spent most of my time reading and talking with Nanny, my parents, and some of the other relatives that visited every once in a while. They talked about pretty much everything except Granddaddy, but I knew none of us had forgotten him. Every time he moaned, “Oh, Claire,” Nanny’s name, I worried those words would be his last.

The days drug by, and my grandfather certainly didn’t get any better. However, he didn’t lose his sense of humor. One day, someone told him that my Uncle Dean was coming. Uncle Dean can talk an awful lot. When Granddaddy heard that, he put his hands up by his head and pulled them apart as he made exploding noises, saying in his own special way that Uncle Dean dispenses a bit too much information for a single brain to handle. You’d have to know Uncle Dean to understand.

Granddaddy was in the Navy when he was younger, but he didn’t talk about it much when he was alive, except when he told people how he lost his hair. He said he was going down some steep stairs on a submarine or a boat, I forget which, and he fell down the stairs and his hair came out. I doubt it was true, but that’s what he said. That’s just like him, though. He never bragged because he was so humble. That’s one of the things that made him so special.

My dad talked with Nanny a lot about my Aunt Dottie and Uncle Dave, who had died recently. First, Aunt Dottie died, then Uncle Dave committed suicide. They talked about their will, and who would get what, and who knows what else. I figured two deaths were enough for one summer, and I didn’t want any more.

Granddaddy is very important to me because he is the root of my strange sense of humor, as far as I know. The only other living people like him in my family like him are my dad and me. When Granddaddy was a bit healthier, he’d call me almost every week and we’d exchange jokes. Not anymore, tho