2005-03-17

It's really hard to actually grieve. It's nothing like you think it will be. I thought I'd come back to California, rattle around the house alone, look at all of Grandpop's haunts, so to speak (and I wish he was haunting- kinda), and then I'd cry and weep and throw stuff and punch pillows and feel very refreshed and philosophical about the whole thing afterwards.

I grieved for my grandmom. I was pretty darn close to her, too. But I didn't live with her. We weren't roomies for three years and we actually didn't have as much in common as my grandpop and I did. For instance- a strange and singular kind of humor that most people don't find funny as in Hilaire Belloc-(especially all things involving Alexander Bing- even saying that is funny if you're me and Grandpop).

Anyway, I really thought my grief would be dramatic and violent and quick. It's none of those. I can't seem to have a productive cry (if there's a such thing- and I kind of think there is) where you fell drained and rested afterwards. I just have these tiny bouts of gravity (best way I can say it) where my face feels sort of pulled down and I feel that a drop or two is being squeezed from my eye when i reflect on how empty things seem right now.

It's not like I don't love my father and stepmom and my cousins and aunts and uncles. But Grandpop was a kind of bouncing board for most things that went on in my life. A very conservative, Catholic bouncing board. I used to ask his advice on most things. Because his was a point of view unlike anyone else's and with years behind it.

I couldn't, of course, tell him some things. But I think everyone should have someone like him in their lives. Someone that inspires them to be on their best behavior (no dirty words and proper grammar and no short skirts). I still, when I'm watching a movie, wonder if I should have Grandpop watch it. He loved romantic comedies that were pretty clean and I'd always be scanning my memory for things to rent for him. There were some pretty unexpected things he got a kick out of:

Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Uncle Buck
Sleepless in Seattle
Topsy Turvy (after I cut out the booby part- which he had a point about- it was unecessary and didn't mix welll with the rest of the film)
The Cutting Edge
You've got Mail
Notting Hill
The Englishman who went up a hill...
Crocodile Dundee
Sabrina (He liked the remake better)
The Winslow Boy (Also liked the remake better)

Things just feel a bit hollow, like there's no reason to do many things because I always wanted to impress Grandpop and now I won't know what he thinks of me.

But the fact is, my life will go on without him and it could be good, too. The problem is that it will be less fun and less meaningful to me. There are certain jokes only he would get, there are certain articles and anecdotes and current events that only he would want to know about. There are certain things I wanted to achieve with his reaction in mind. And then there's the problem of his thirteen kids.

The thirteen sit in enemy camps. Some are direct enemies and some take the cause of this sibling against that and get in on it, too. Grandmom was so sweet and kind and alltogether lovable that people would swallow their differences for her sake and not go all-out on their wars.

Grandpop was a bit sterner. It wasn't as if he was feared at this stage in their lives. But no one wanted him displeased with them. Everyone wanted his good opinion because it was hard to get. That was the last bit of glue holding them together. Now the fights might escalate. There may never be another wedding, holiday, funeral where every Walsh comes together and gets a little drunk and tells exaggerated stories about each other. It's just going to be fight, fight, fightiness.

I love having this big a family, really. I like the fact that I have always looked forward to family parties. I hope I don't get all crazy nervous before them like in this last month.

I don't know. Anyhow- more when I'm not nursing a headache and a bottle of white merlot.

I know.

This place is turning itno The Grandpop Show.

Bear with me. I just can't stop thinking about him. Hence writing about him.