Remembering Grandpa

I received an unsettling email from my cousin Elmer yesterday:

Dude,

I'm coming to Frisco next week and I'm leaving the wife at home. I figure by the time I roll into town, I'll be bustin' for a fuck so do me a favor and hook me up with some of that fine local tail. Hoo Doggy!

And oh yeah, I almost forgot. Gramps is dead. Bummer (kinda).

CUL8R,

Elmer

I appreciated Elmer breaking the news to me but there were a lot of questions left unanswered. How? When? Without knowing these things, the healing process could drag on for days. I telephoned my cousin to find out exactly what happened.

Grandpa lived in a house on an embankment and had been confined to a wheelchair for years. According to Elmer, teenage pranksters greased the ramp leading from the front door as well as the driveway below. When Grandpa hit that grease, he couldn't stop. He slid all the way to the street and straight into the path of an oncoming steamroller. The old boy never had a chance.

My earliest memories of my grandfather were not knowing which side of the family he came from. For years, neither of my parents would claim as kin. It wasn't until a family reunion with my father's relative that the secret was revealed.

"No use denying it any longer," said Dad. "I admit it. He's my father. Please don't hold it against me."

I didn't. It wasn't his fault Grandpa would shake his fist when he visited, shouting racial epithets and accusing my parents of trying to poison him with my mother's bad cooking. He was different with us children though. He would just calmly tell us that we might as well give up now because with a mom and dad like ours, none of us would ever amount to shit.

That all changed when Grandpa, a lifetime pipe smoker, was diagnosed with throat cancer. After the tracheotomy and the removal of his larynx, there was no more yelling. He just hissed. We liked him better that way.

The last time I saw my grandfather was Thanksgiving dinner at Elmer's house in 2005. Elmer has this dog named Roscoe, a Maltese who is kept away from guests because he gets too excited by their presence and wants to hump them. There was quite a commotion when Roscoe got into the dining room. He charged straight at my grandfather, leaped up, and clamped onto his face like that thing that came out of the egg in Alien.

Roscoe started pumping away. From where I was sitting, I could see the dog's engorged member sliding in and out of Grandpa's throat stoma. After a couple of minutes, Elmer intervened and pried the dog away.

"Fun is fun, Roscoe," said Elmer. "But Gramps needs to breathe. Don't worry, Gramps. You just just got a little lovin' down the wrong pipe. It'll cough up."

Looking back, I'm going to miss Grandpa in a way. I know Roscoe sure will.