What Will You Leave Behind?
Nancy Davis is a freelance writer. She is also a content editor and social media blogger for Melen LLC. Follow her on Twitter. Thanks for the wonderful post, Nancy!
My Godfather is going into hospice. He has battled with alcoholism most of his life. Gangrene claimed his right leg above his knee back in 2005, and now it wants his left leg. I spoke to him and told him that I loved him. The conversation was extremely painful. Not because he is dying, because death is part of life. It was sad because of what he has become.
It makes me sad to think of the man he once was. The tragedy is that he is a shell of his former self. My Godfather marched to the beat of his own drum. He never did what anyone ever expected him to do. He was the youngest of three brothers, he grew up in the Bronx where fighting in the streets was how you got respect. He blew off the first three fingers on his right hand shooting off fireworks on the 4th of July as a teen. He was left with stumps.
It didn’t stop him from becoming one of the best auto body men around. He could restore any car. He was highly mechanical, and understood what it took to make something work.
I will never forget riding on the back of his motorcycle in my Easter dress. I was maybe 8 years old and I thought he was the coolest guy on Earth. He was a daredevil. There was absolutely nothing he would not try at least once. He had a fast temper, and we used to just write off his erratic behavior as “passionate” He married several times. He was not someone who would do what you wanted. He did what he wanted when he wanted to. I don’t want you to get the impression that he was a bad guy, he was not. In many ways he was deeply misunderstood. I could not have lived with his gifts. They would have driven me insane.
He was deeply psychic. He read tarot cards and did natal astrological charts. He accurately predicted my father’s open heart surgery on my 12th birthday in 1980. His gifts were heavy to him. He was deeply connected to me, and when I wound up in the hospital with a severe gallbladder attack a year and a half ago, he called. He felt something was wrong with me. Had I been in an accident? He said he felt that I was in a hospital. I was in the hospital. He knew things without me telling him. He always seemed to pick the exact right time to call me.
I prefer to remember him this way. Not what he has become. I prefer to think of him working on a car, a Pall Mall cigarette between his lips, with his eagle tattoo showing. I want to remember him talking about spirituality. I want to remember the good times, and forget the bad.
Memory is a funny thing – sometimes if we are very lucky, we can summon those moments about a loved one that make us smile rather than cry, I sit at my computer, tears shining in my eyes, and one single tear is sliding down my face.
No one knows when we will speak to someone for the last time, so I wanted to call him today to tell him I love him, just in case.
Image by Alicia Jo McMahan. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/ajmac
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Twelve hours before my father died from a sudden heart attack, I arrived home late and he greeted me at the front door half-asleep. We had planned on going out for brunch in the morning so I said, “See you in the morning, Dad. Good night.”
My brunch was spent in the “Quiet Room” of the hospital.
You’re correct that you never know when your sentence to someone will be the last words that someone will ever hear.
I am so sorry to hear that Ari. I recall when I first left my husband, what would be my last conversation with my best friend was ‘see you tomorrow to have pizza and watch the Yankee game” I had no idea that would be the last time I would ever get to talk to him.
Life is really short. Things like this really do put things into perspective don’t they?
Nobody is perfect and it’s nice to have someone in your life that the good memories and strong, vivid and memorable. It sounds like he lived life on his terms and what more could you ask for. It might have not been the easiest path, but it was his path.
Thanks for sharing this.
You are right. He lived life his way. He did what he wanted when he wanted to do it. I loved him for that, but it intimidated me too. I wanted to be that ballsy. 🙂 I loved that he did as he pleased, and lived life to the fullest. In a lot of ways, we were very different, but in reality we were very much the same.
Isn’t it wonderful to really see another person for all that they are? He just couldn’t help being himself! And for that you sound very grateful. I never understood adults and why they changed so much as they aged when I was a little girl. It’s very humbling to see illness ravage a body and even start to infect a person’s spirit. I thank God every day that I have the ability to remember people that I’ve loved even though they are, as you say, “a shell” of who they once were.
Wonderful post Nancy!
That is exactly it Betsy. he was just himself. I loved him no matter what because to me, he was so different than anyone else in the family. He also understood me better than my parents did.
Part of why I wrote this post was to do exactly that – remember him as he was then, not as he is now.
What a beautiful piece. It makes me think of a quote: “There’s so much good in the worst of us and Bad in the best of us That it ill behooves any of us To find fault with the rest of us.” It’s amazing what we will see and appreciate in others if we remember this quotation. We can choose to see the good and celebrate the wonderful traits, as you already have. I’m sorry to hear about your Godfather….
Thanks Ali,
That was the amazing thing about him when he was young. There was so much good in him, it made me want to forgive the bad. I think we would have better relationships if we did that more. Some flaws need to be overlooked sometimes.
Very sorry to hear about your godfather. This was a very sweet tribute to him.
Thanks Jack. I am really glad you liked it.