I must have been around seven, seven or eight, though it could have been nine -- certainly no later -- when I met my paternal grandfather the first time. If he held me as a baby and surely he must have, I'd be hard-pressed to dig the memory out of my distal recesses. The other first time, however, is as vivid as this morning's frost on the grass.
He lived in Oklahoma, my parents and I in Colorado, and he'd come for a short visit. More like a stopover than a "visit," he was gone the next morning. I sat in a brown or green -- I never knew which -- overstuffed relic from the 1940s with short, fat wooden feet and a flowery pattern that rose off the fabric like continents on a globe. It was big enough to curl up in while he talked with my parents about people and places they knew and I did not. After a while, he turned to me and suddenly young blabbermouth Beggar was at a loss for words. Particularly, the ones he wanted to hear.
"Have you learned how to cuss yet?"
For the record, I wasn't really at a loss for words -- by then I'd acquired a vocabulary of two bad and two really bad words and combinations thereof, thanks to my father's verbal creativity. I just wasn't supposed to say them. Ever. And now, here's my father's father, asking me to do what would ordinarily result in my catching the word that began with an "h" and ended with me wishing I'd said "heck," instead. I looked from my mother to my father, hoping for permission. They may as well have been playing poker for all the help I got from their expressions. Hell -- I mean, heck -- of a time to enforce the rules.
"Come on, Beg, you must know one or two. Let me hear you cuss," he said with a truly conspiratorial glint and grin. Let's play a good one on your folks, I read. Talk about caught between "the devil" and the deep blue sea. I wanted to, oh, how I wanted to, the blood rising to my neck and then flowing like a flood over my face.
The clock was ticking, he was waiting, they're silent, and all I can think is, "Damn it, Grandad, you know I'll get in trouble if I do!" If there was ever a time I needed a Get Out of Jail Free card.
"Well, I can see you'd rather not go against your folks and that's good. We can save the cuss words for later," he said, winking, after my shirt had nearly soaked through with nervous sweat.
I felt relieved, but also felt I'd let him down. I wanted to do both, be good (and incidentally, avoid a lickin') and be grown up at the same time. It's funny how these things go. Eventually, you do find out how to be both at once and true to yourself in the bargain. Back then, all I knew was, that's the night I began to love my grandfather.
I sure hope he knows.
(English: New Year's Day postcard. Reads: "A New Year's Resolution / Jan.
1st / To Gossip, Slang and Cuss words / I'll bid a last "Adieu" / And
place a bridle on my tongue / And thoughtless actions, too!" Photo
credit: Wikipedia)
"Oh,
God!" he sighed, heavily. So heavily I thought he and the ancient,
paint-stained, ladder back chair he was sitting in were going to sink
through the scraped and scratched wooden plank floor to the soil
beneath. I waited for the thunk! -- it never came. His eyes were closed, but he wasn't sleeping. Nor was he being profane.
"It's
all right, Beggar, he's just praying," my grandmother said, overhearing
him. I wondered if she knew how many times I'd heard him before. So
many I'd lost count.
I
looked at her and smothered a smile. Did she really believe that or was
she trying to preserve my youthful innocence, the very thing my
grandfather -- her husband -- had done his best to turn into good
judgment, something he considered eminently more practical.
He
did the "sighing thing," as I came to think of it, mostly while sitting
in the shade near our bunkhouse door. It wasn't really a bunkhouse, but
we called it that, just the same. It was a detached single car garage
that had never housed a car, at least in my memory. My father converted
it into a saddle shop at one point and I've written about cutting firewood for
his stove. Summers, it was the bunkhouse where my grandfather stayed.
Those months, I've realized since, were a journey in character
development.
"If you absolutely have to point a gun at
someone to protect yourself or your family," he said once, "it's too
late for threats. Indecision at a time like that can be deadly." He
spoke from experience. Another summer night, years before, he stared
down a neighbor who had the nasty habit of occasionally firing his gun
in the general direction of my grandfather. "The man's crazy," he said,
refusing to get dragged into something he knew he'd have to finish, "and
besides, he can't shoot worth a damn." Only this particular evening, it
was different. The man had shot at my father who was about my age and I
was thirteen.
Why
not call the police or sheriff, I imagine you're thinking. That would
have been the thing to do, if they'd had a phone. Forty miles into
barely civilized northwestern Colorado, the ranch was a two or three
hour drive by Model A Ford from the nearest town. There were no phones,
nor were there corner stores or gas stations. I'm not even sure there
was electricity. It wasn't that you took the law into your own hands,
there just wasn't anyone else who could take it into theirs.
So,
father and son rode out to address the situation. Watching the scene
unfold, my father was fearful, certain he was going to witness my
grandfather meet out justice just as his father had fifty years
earlier. In my imagination, reliving those long seconds, I see my
grandfather with a look in his eye that left no doubt, as his hand
strayed to the pistol at his side, that he fully intended to use it. The
neighbor must have seen that look, too, because he backed down and that
was the end of it.
Grandchildren
are a second chance for parents to get it right. Those summers, I was
my grandfather's trusty teen sidekick, Cowboy Toby to his Roy Rogers (photo).
I listened, learned, and hopefully digested far more than I actually
remember. I've never forgotten the "sighing thing," though, nor the day I
finally asked him what it meant.
I'd
really been hoping he'd tell me himself when he was good and ready.
That's how things usually went between us, though I never knew from day
to day where his mind would lead. But it was nearing the end of summer
and he'd said nothing, so I screwed up the courage one day and asked
what was he thinking about when he sighed so deeply. He was surprised
I'd noticed. How could I not?
"You live as long as I have, Beggar, you're going to make a few mistakes.
Don't be afraid, everybody makes a few and so will you. Some, maybe
most, don't matter, least not as much as we give them credit for. People
who know you, forgive like you forgive them. Some mistakes do matter --
maybe more than they should, but that doesn't change the fact. Problem
is, you either don't realize it or you're too stubborn to admit it,
until it's too late. I think about those."
"So you don't make the same ones again, right?"
"No, because I made them the first time."
I
was too young to understand regret. Sorry, wish I hadn't said or done
this or that, oh yes -- plenty. Regret was something else, something -- I
don't know -- bigger, something I hadn't lived long enough to
become acquainted with. Something that only comes about with experience,
with trying to do what you think is right even though you don't and
can't know everything but you have to try anyway because it's all you
can do and it's really all anyone can do. Don't worry, we all make
mistakes, so will you. It's okay. My grandfather said so.
Happy Thanksgiving.
(Creative Commons image by vintagecobweb,com via Flickr)
