My Grandpa had a stroke 10 years ago when he was going out to feed his chickens. He fell and laid on the floor of his barn for 8 hours, unable to move, until concerned neighbors saw that his lights weren’t on that night and came to check on him. He was rushed to hospital, where they had him in intensive care for a few days. His blood pressure was 220 over 80 and we were told he probably wouldn’t survive.
He defied everyone’s expectations and pulled through. Despite remaining paralyzed on his right side and confined to a wheelchair, his personality and memory survived mostly intact. There were some times when his mind would drift somewhere we couldn’t follow, and sometimes he couldn’t understand things we told him, but he was still my same old Grandpa. We were able to get full care for him in a small farming town nursing home, which was staffed by wonderfully kind and caring Mennonite women. It became his new home and he made a lot of friends there. We went to visit him every week and brought him home for the day on family birthdays and holidays. Our amazement never ceased about how he had beaten the odds in 1996.
He was always a fighter. His mother died of a kidney infection when he was only 3 years old. His father remarried, but never got over the pain of losing his wife. He took it out on my grandpa, his only child by her, by beating him often in drunken rages. My grandpa carried scars from those beatings on his back for the remainder of his life.
He served in the Merchant Marines during WWII. He was desperate for a job, and they originally hired on the ship as a cook, but - he didn’t know how to cook. At all. I remember him saying with a grin that he realized he had to learn how to cook, and fast, before they threw him overboard. He did, and became so good that some of the sailors cried when it came time for him to move on.
After the War, he started his own business as an appliance repairman. Lots of people around town got to know him. No matter what he was hired for - washing machine, fridge, dryer, dishwasher - he could fix it.
We lost my grandma, a beautiful kind woman, to lung cancer in 1986. My grandpa fell into a deep depression that lasted for years. We made sure we were around him as much as possible to support him. It was a long hard time, but we all pulled through.
When he retired, he did what he always wanted to do and bought himself a small house out in the country - his “ranch”, as he called it. He raised chickens and sold poultry and eggs to his neighbors. He volunteered at a trout hatchery down the road. It was only 2 years after retiring that his stroke hit.
Last week we heard that he had developed pneumonia. The doctor there examined him and said that he should recover fine. Then, on Thursday night, I got a call from my mom saying that he had taken a turn for the worse.
My parents, my brother and my aunt and uncle all went up to be with him. By the time we got there he was in a coma. His entire body heaved with effort as he tried to take each ragged breath. The ventilator at his bedside was helping to deliver the oxygen to him that he so badly needed. The nurses there told us that he didn’t have long and all they could do is try to make him as comfortable as possible.
We all told him we loved him. We held his hand and talked to him. He could hear us. He squeezed our hands and was able to blink signals for yes and no. He was burning up with fever and we put cool cloths on his head and under his arms. My mom and I massaged his dry hands and feet with lotion. We all sat by his side for hours and just talked to him, saying what needed to be said, telling him jokes, sharing memories. All of Wednesday night and into the day on Thursday. At least 2 of us were always by his side at all times.
Mid-afternoon on Thursday, his labored breathing suddenly got gentler. The nurses told us it wouldn’t be much longer. They also told us that they were surprised that he had survived this long already - most folks in his condition went quickly.
Around 8pm, his frequency of breaths began to drop off until he was only taking a couple of breaths a minute. My mom, who sings professionally for weddings, began to sing to him. When she did, he took a deep sigh and didn’t breathe again. He died at 8:15pm last night.
My grandpa wasn’t a rich man, but he was tough as nails and always made sure he provided for his family and pulled through the worst situations. His birthday is tomorrow. We’ve decided to go ahead and have a party as planned, because he would have wanted it that way. He would have turned 81.
I love you, grandpa, and I hope that I can live up to be even half as stong as you were. Goodbye, and thanks for the memories.
To have such loving family, truly he was the richest of the rich.