WELCOME TO THE REAL WORLD
“Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really
love. It will not lead you astray.”
-Rumi
I’m
officially the worst granddaughter ever. It has taken me five unforgivable days
to get this blog posted and for that, I am very very sorry. Nevertheless, November 9th was an
extraordinarily important day: MY PAPA’S BIRTHDAY! Once again, I’m at a loss for trying to
describe the person I love. This is
always so difficult for me because I feel like my words can’t always do my
heart justice when I attempt to express how I feel about someone. Anyways, I will do my best to praise one of
the most important men in my life…
I have
great friends and they come from great families and they have great stories to
tell about their great lives with the great families they come from, but
honestly, they pale in comparison to my great family. Sometimes I hear my friends tell stories
about how sweet and nice their grandfathers are and I want to be like NO. YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND. You grandpa ain’t got nothing on either of
mine! (Rest assured I do not in fact say
this, as I would like to keep my friends.)
But honestly I have the best grandfathers a girl could ask for. Pop is particularly special just cause. When I was little I used to tell everyone
that I was going to marry Pop when I grew up.
Creepy as that may have been, I was a very wise youngster and I meant
it…not literally of course, but Pop is everything a man should be: he puts his
family before himself over and over again, he is kind, he is a wonderful cook,
he sings, he still dotes on my Dolly, and he makes very strong drinks. If I can one day find a husband that is half
the man that my Papa is, I will be a very drunk lucky girl.
One year
Pop was given the very formidable task of picking me up from camp. This can be a traumatic experience for anyone
as I spend the majority of the day weeping over friends that I won’t see for a
year…yikes. Anyways, Pop showed up with
my favorite snacks and a mission: he had brought along a map and together we
were going to try to find a license plate from all 50 states on the way from
Nashville to Cleveland. By the time we
neared Cleveland, I think we had like 46 of the 50 license plates, and what did
Pop do? Took me to two Cracker Barrels,
the alleged hotspots for tourists.
Honestly, I don’t even remember if we found the other four plates but I
to this day remember the feeling of amazement and appreciation I felt for this
man who was working so hard to make me feel special-he wanted me to have fun
and not be sad about leaving all my friends behind. I wish I had known what a good friend I had
sitting next to me in that driver’s seat…
I could
sing his praises all day, but the last story I will tell is best described as
“the ranking”. I know this comes as a
real shocker to you all, but I like to win.
Everything is (sometimes unreasonably) a competition and a few years ago
(when my terrible aunts decided to infringe on mine and Whit’s reign as
grandchildren by having three kids!?!?!) I developed a ranking system, 1-5, 1
being the favorite. I, sassy as I am, of
course claimed the #1 spot for myself.
This position has lasted for a number of reasons: my brother has wonderfully been blessed with
a sense of humor and the ability to look over my dysfunction, my other cousins
are too young to care, and Pop wants to humor me I guess. As the years have
passed, Pop and I have exchanged numerous emails/letters/gifts/phone calls with
each other and each time he addresses me as #1 and I depart him as #1. What I realized the other day when he
responded (as so few people do) to one of my blogs is that he is my #1. Papa, you have no idea how much you mean to
me. I think about you when I see Cracker
Barrels, out of state license plates, pistachios (your favorite nut), western
movies, or love in the world.
A very
happy belated birthday to you, Papa! I will be waiting to see you at
Thanksgiving, life savers and tomatoes in tow J
Love ya. Miss
ya. Mean it.
Lei scarpini de bailare,
Kane
