AFG. My world.

I've found myself inconsolable today, seeing as it's Grandpa's birthday today. The worst part about it is I woke up and forgot until I saw my aunt say something on Facebook. I mean, the fact that that happened makes me sick. The fact that he is dead makes me sick.

He changed my life forever. He inspired a great deal of my character, mind, and attributes and it breaks my heart to wonder about what a kind of effect he could have had on me now and within the last couple of  years if he had lived. I wonder how much better of a person I might have ended up being, smarter even.

"They" always say that time heals everything, but even after 8 years I still feel an ache and weight in my chest whenever I think about him. I cry just as hard if not more than at his funeral and I was fighting to breathe that day. Everything about him and the world as I saw it when he was alive is still so vivid. I remember the dark color of his skin, the lines on his feet, his smile, the smell of sawdust, the feel of the green carpet in his living room, how he walked from the garage to the house with his cane, the way he wrote on his notepad. I remember the swish of his snap pants, the smell and chill of the basement--dark and damp. The Cubs, grapefruit, golf, fig newtons, the news anchors (black man/red head female) on in the morning, wood, math/numbers, coins, states/capitals, etc., all remind me of him.  The smallest things left such a great impression on my memory and heart. The big things left their mark for sure, too.

He gave me my world and the desire to reach and work for it. To earn what I want. He taught me integrity, cleverness, fortitude, curiosity, honesty. He taught me things that matter and gave me a way of thinking and looking at things that I treasure so greatly. He made little things, big things. Every bit of information and knowledge I could learn or acquire was valuable, I was valuable. Knowledge was something worth the time and effort. Most of all, he believed in me and believed that I was capable and worthy of having knowledge and integrity and I may not have understood it then, but I sure as hell do now and I couldn't appreciate it more.

I hate that I was so young when I knew him, because I wasn't able to really know him. I knew things about him, but I didn't truly know who he was--as a father, as a brother, as a worker, as a friend, as a man, as himself.  I didn't get to ask him questions about people, about the world, about life, about myself, about real things. I have a really strong feeling that if we had had the chance those would have been some of the best conversations I would have ever had. I wish he could know me, too. Who I became and who I want to become.

I would give anything to have one more conversation with him.