I have never felt the feeling of loss. It’s a weird feeling, like someone you love is gone but it doesn’t seem like they are. It is a numbing feeling and doesn’t wear off right away. I remember when my dad told me my grandpa had passed away. I was in my room doing homework when he came in saying that he was flying out to Phoenix, AZ that night. I was confused yet somewhat relieved. Now before you take that the wrong way, let me explain. My grandpa was suffering from multiple diseases, one of them was Parkinson’s. Honestly I don’t know what some of the diseases he had were or what they were called but I knew they were awful and I knew that they were slowly taking his life away.

For as long as I can remember he had been sick. I watched him decline he whole life. When I was around the age of five we would play a game with his thumb. Yes, his thumb. When he was younger because he worked on a farm and somehow managed cut his thumb off. How he did this, I do not know but still it make me laugh that he chopped his thumb in half. Anyways, he would tuck each thumb into fists and shuffle his hands around and then ask me which one was the long thumb and which one was the short thumb. I always got it right, but still I loved to play that game.

That is one of the few memories I have of my grandpa. We would play with lincoln logs and board games and sometimes go on walks in the summer when him and my grandma would come stay with us for the short three months. I would put on my roller skates, my brother would ride his bike, and my grandpa would drive around his motorized scooter and chase us while honking his horn. My grandma would just walk behind us smiling or next to my grandpa checking up on him.

We used to take walks every evening while the sun would go down, but that stopped when my grandpa’s health had become so bad that he couldn’t travel from Arizona to Kansas any longer.

A part of me is thankful that I didn’t have to see him when he was coming to the end of his life, I wouldn’t be able to handle it. It was hard enough when we visited them every Christmas. I didn’t like watching him eat because it was hard for him and I was scared he was going to choke. He couldn’t talk without stuttering each word so whenever he asked me a question I would turn to my grandpa to interpret what he said.

I miss my grandpa, the grandpa who would go on walks and play board games, not the one who was declining rapidly with every breath he took. My dad tells me so many stories about him working out in their barn on cars or riding horses. It’s amazing how much can change in such a short time. It only took seven years of sickness to take him but for me it seemed like a lifetime. It always amazes me how active my grandpa was when my dad reminisces about his childhood. My grandpa was brilliant. He broke away from what his father and his father’s father did their lives and became an x-ray doctor. He had an entire series over how to take x-rays, honestly I really don’t know much about it but I do know that he taught himself how to be an x-ray doctor. He finished his final book just in time before he couldn’t think straight about his normal life.

January 6, 2014. The last day of his life. Like I said before, I am sad that he is gone but happy that he has been relieved of all the pain he went through. He had the strongest Christian faith out of anyone. He was kind-hearted, gracious, and strong (mentally). I know that he is now with his Creator, freed from his temporary and physical pain, and for that I am truly thankful.