Wow. I’m pretty sure I’ve started another “blog” with that exact sentiment but I’m too goddamn lazy to even check for sure. My brain is swimming. I feel maybe more insane and unfocused than I have in a bit. It’s been yet another long and insane week full to the brim with adventures, emotions, a friend I haven’t seen in a very very long time, change I’m unsure of how to deal with properly, travel, and well, death.
In life it appears that there are always people who make a real mark on you, on us. There are always individuals who stand out, stand alone, push others, have strong stances and opinions, those whose stories, or words, or advice, or love or even hate presses a permanent stamp upon us. Those people tend to be the folks who remain, with us on our adventures, and our “paths” so to speak. I don’t want to write a goddamn Doogie Howser blog, but I guess I can’t avoid it when writing about something of this nature. My very close friend told me kindly that I’m not good at articulating myself when speaking verbally, but when I write, what I’m thinking seems to make sense. And everyone else tells me that I’m fairly good about tying everything in together, so the rambling began, and maybe the writing will commence.
My grandfather was one of the most amazing people I have known since my existence. I have very vivid memories of him even when I was a very young child. He had a way about him, and not in your typical “well, you know, he’s my grandpa and I love him kind of a way”. He spoke to us (my siblings and I) while we were children, as adults. And he expected us to cognitively understand him, as a human being. There was never any “goo goo gaga” with him. I can specifically remember him priming me at a very young age to ask questions and expect answers. By the time I was 8 years old I was given his already read copies of National Geographic. By the time I was 10, I was reading Smithsonian magazine. I was in the 2nd grade when my mother, my then stepfather, my sister, my brother and myself moved in with my grandfather. He would sit and talk to me, answering my eighty million questions fairly patiently and recommended suggestions on how I could possibly learn more. My grandfather loved music, books and travel. He loved logic. He was passionate about things and subjects that I suppose the mind would call more rational than “romantic”. He created my love of geography, science, and philosophy. He was a man of the world, with epic tales of navy adventures, the way life was “then”, the common man’s dream, the super natural, the other worldly opportunities of the imagination and the ability to really, sincerely do whatever the fuck you really put your mind to. He was cut from a rare cloth. He contradicted himself in the fact that he was the most pessimistic optimist I have ever known. He taught me most things I carry along in my mental handbook for the living. He awakened me at such a severely young age and he expected the world of me…and I tried. And I still try mostly because of him.
While sitting around at Christmas just after my 16th birthday he saw me thumbing through an album I created of photographs from magazines. I had been cutting images out for over a year and keeping them to pour over, enjoy, question, and wonder about. He asked me why I had made such an album and why I wasn’t making my own photographs. I answered simply that I had not had my own camera. He then decided that I should own a camera if I was that interested in images and that I should be making my own images, to eventually create my own “album”. He took me a few weeks later to the army/navy exchange at the then functioning navy yard in Philadelphia and bought me my very first camera. I remember feeling really quite embarrassed that I was given something of such value and then taking it to my secret hiding spot and trying to figure the damn thing out. I started making images because my grandfather believed in me. I wasn’t any good at it for a few years, but his sincere belief pushed me always to continue. He came to every show I had (in Philadelphia) and would stand and look at my work and tell me that when I was ready, he would help me publish a book. His approval was genuine, because, when I was dicking around and being lazy, he would never hesitate to let me know that if I neglected to work hard, I’d fall by the wayside, like every other “jackass with a shitbrained dream”. He expected the most, nothing less, and because of this, for the most part, I have never settled for anything less than I “want”. He did this with most of us. My mother would contest that he did in fact, change her life. He changed many people’s lives. And hilariously enough, I suppose most people would find him fairly disagreeable, ornery, slightly intellectually snobbish and sometimes too downright honest. He was a man who stood by his word, and because he believed that he lived by his word, he expected nothing less of others. He molded me to understand respect. He taught me the importance of keeping a promise and meaning what you say. He taught me to respect myself overall, and explained graciously over many years the extreme power of self-respect and self-belief. He was by no means a wealthy man, but seemed to live life to the fullest of his hopes and dreams. My grandfather really might be the most important human being in my life. And now he’s gone. Hilariously enough, I don’t feel as though he’s gone. He believed in life after death. I’m almost positive he’s standing over me at this moment correcting my grammar and telling me how to make this more to the point. I’m also sure he understands that much like him, I can never really quite get to the point, until I have winded myself.
We corresponded with one another for many years, both of us sending many pages of our adventures, our past, our hopes, our beliefs and our experiences. We had a sincere bond, and I genuinely looked forward to his letters each month, most often times reading them aloud to my friends. He had such a perspective, a vibrant way of linguistically illustrating all that was happening, or had happened in his life. Oh he could paint a picture. His letters encouraged me to write, to photograph, to live, to love, to travel to feel every breath I was taking in and pushing out, to observe and to document. They pushed me to not care what people think of me, to not doubt myself, to keep going, keep moving; feed the longing, to not give into the weaknesses. They reminded me to appreciate all that was around me, to tell those around me how grateful I am for their friendship. They encouraged me to reach into the actual depths of my insane imagination and believe in the unreal, the impossible, the ridiculous and the absurd. I suppose in a sense, my own letters to him provided him with entertainment and perhaps a sense of pride. Our connection and simple camaraderie gave me comfort in my darkest and weakest times. As his health declined, his letters became sparse. I would hold onto each word if in fact he did return a letter. I was expecting the worst after awhile, but I felt as though he was preparing me. In reality though, nothing could have prepared me. I feel strange. I feel older. I feel as if I am in some emotional vacuum. I can’t quite explain it. He’s gone…I know he’s gone. But I guess, when you’re a person of such magnitude, of such quality and such presence, you don’t really “go”. He engraved in us such a force of will. He instilled such a burning sense of “living” that it is impossible to actually let him go. And like those people who tend to impress on you, on us, their own way of being, they stick with you, through thick and thin, through the most amazing times and the most boring, through life and death. They just remain who they are or who they were, and you (us) are affected by them continually, not necessarily by accident or by fate, but perhaps by necessity. Thank you Karl. You certainly did always say, “if you don’t like where you are, change your mind” and you certainly always meant it. And I’ll be goddamned if I’m not grateful for that one…amongst all the rest. Spose I’ll see you again when I get there myself….until then….
-KG
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