Every Sunday after dinner at my Nanny and Granddad’s house we would transfer from the kitchen back to the living room.
My mom would help my Nanny with the dishes.
And my Granddad?
He’d finish his whiskey.
Which whiskey?
Maybe it was his first.
Not likely though.
As a kid?
I loved the smell of Crown on the rocks.
He was a whiskey man - a rye drinker.
Before long, whilst sitting in his chair, he’d pass out.
I figured that’s what being an old man was all about - passing out on a Sunday evening surrounded by family.
Invariably he’d snore.
As he snored?
I’d tickle his feet.
He’d wake with grunts and a start and a big scowl on his face.
Once he saw who was playing with his feet, that scowl would melt.
Some suggest that kids do stuff like this to bring their elders back to sobriety - that we missed him somehow.
That wasn’t the case.
Tickling passed out Granddad’s toes was the entire point of the game.
But meow?
Thirty five years after his passing?
We’ve missed him a long time meow.
They say alcohol is a big part of pancreatic cancer.
So perhaps ‘missing him’ while he was drunk wasn’t the problem.
When I visit my nanny these days she talks about how long he’s been gone and what it was like when he was going.
Mostly though?
She talks about how much she misses him.
There are days dear reader that I miss going out for beers with pals.
But then?
I think of all that my Granddad missed out on.
And how much he’s been missed.