MyFoxPhilly

First, I want to apologize for disappearing for so long (or at least so uncharacteristically long for me). My maternal grandfather, to whom I was very close, passed away just over three weeks ago, which put me in a bit of an odd place for a while. I have this tendency, when I’m going through something emotionally new or strange (whether good or bad), to kind of shut down and go silent. As someone who is a generally decent enough communicator, this is something I’ve never quite understood about my own emotional make-up. But it is who I am; I can’t really talk much about things I don’t understand just after they’ve happened. Now, three weeks later, I’m finally starting to come unwound, accept my grandfather’s passing as well as its circumstances (which I’ll get to later), and maybe best of all, find some solace in the many memories with which he’s left me.

A little bit about my grandfather and what made him so inimitable and endearing to me: For better or worse, he was the black sheep of the family. While he didn’t live with us, after my grandmother died, he spent an awful lot of time with me and my family while I was growing up; he was sort of a Kramer-like presence in our home. And at a time when my parents were trying to raise me as an educated, disciplined, and poised young lady, he always seemed to be doing or saying something they deemed misguided and a bad influence. For a while when I was in junior high school, for example, he took charge of driving me to school. But often, if I wasn’t much in the mood for school, we’d end up somewhere else entirely – either at a park, a local diner, or the best – a movie theater – going from one film to the next for the entire day, with popcorn and Jordan Almonds serving as lunch. My parents caught onto this when they demanded an explanation from me after being handed a stack of “sick notes” in my grandfather’s handwriting at a parent-teacher conference. Another time, my grandfather told me that all people worth knowing have an affinity for three things: coffee, scotch and cigars. So at the tender age of twelve, Grandpa Jacque began my character-building: he would feed me a swig of black coffee in the morning before holding out my backpack behind me like a gentleman holds out a ladies’ coat, and began to teach me to distinguish between different blended and single malt scotches and Dominican versus Cuban cigars – this on select afternoons at the kitchen table with a pageant of text books spread out for when my parents arrived home from work. (In fairness to my grandfather, he really did only let me have a few tablespoons of scotch at a time, and a puff or two of his cigars.) In one of his most notorious displays of intransigence, he pondered out loud while eating my mother’s beef stew, that not all of the Ten Commandments struck him as particularly sensible: “I mean coveting your neighbor’s wife?” he said one day. “Okay, it isn’t the most prudent thing in the world to do. But just thinking about it doesn’t mean you’re going to do anything about it. To devote a whole commandment to it?” That one got him kicked out of my parents’ house that night… and got me the evil eye from my mom when I told her that her reaction wasn’t exactly in keeping with Honor Thy Father and Mother.

When I look back now on my childhood, despite my parents’ constant consternation, I realize the gifts my grandfather gave me: permission to be fallible and human, and sometimes even naughty, in the confines of what was otherwise a very strict upbringing; and the notion that having fun is sometime a lot more important than getting ahead. While I was being driven through dawns and dusks to spelling bees and violin recitals and gymnastics competitions, it was my grandfather who would whisper in my ear that I should remember to always do things out of love, not obligation; that the most knowledgeable, hard-working, and disciplined people in the world, without passion, were often the most tedious to be around; and that people too obsessed with winning seldom won people’s hearts. I later found he was pretty much right about all these things.

The end of my grandfather’s life, though, was the real clincher, and pretty much in keeping with its thru line. At 84, of perfectly sound mind, but with a failing body, he took 150 sleeping pills, and called it a night – his last night. The note he left said this: Don’t be upset. I had a great time while I was here. But it’s time to go. Life just isn’t fun anymore when a pretty Yugoslavian woman has to help you to the bathroom. I’m sad, but I understand what he did. There’s something to be said for coming and going on your own terms, and without apology. So just in case he’s out there somewhere and can hear me, this is what I’ve got to say in response: Don’t worry. You aren’t really gone. A piece of you lives on in me.

Leelila_Strogov's Blog

Coffee, Scotch & Cigars

Leelila_Strogov

Inside Fox:
Hot List About Us Good Day TV Listings Politics

Write your comment below: Email me when a new comment is added to this entry