Grandma and Pappy

Today is my Grandma's birthday, and somehow talking about that turned into an hour of my telling stories to my children about my Pappy. We were joined at the hip. He was my favorite person in the world. He died when I was ten, and we'd already made a lifetime of memories by then.

• steam engine rides

• the $13 of stickers that I "needed" 

•  the way he always knew that my knee was hurt because his had been hurting too

• White bread with grape jelly cut into four squares and served on a dixie paper plate in front of the TV at night, where he'd sit in his big green easy chair and Grandma would lay on the yellow sofa.  I would sit in his lap, then transfer to lying on top of Grandma's side.

• The hole in the hedge that I found to shorten the distance to play with Chrissy and Cindy next door that quickly remained trimmed and open 

•  how he said that we just couldn't go that long without being with me if he hadn't seen me for a week

• The two wooden swings he built for my trees at his house and how he's hold my hand and pull back and then let go and send me flying on the half moon rope swing on the walnut tree

•  sitting on the back porch on hot summer nights, the big box fan blowing and the bug zapper zapping to listen to stories of him and his brothers, the trolley they used to ride to Harrisburg to get models that were 15 cents and glue that was 10 cents (or something like that)

• having my own bed in Grandma and Pap's bedroom, but always sleeping in the middle instead 
• driving down past TMI to get our favorite Hershey's black raspberry ice cream cones

• the smell of peppermint and pipe tobacco riding in his car,towel wrapped around bathing suit to watch him direct traffic at a fire

• "Pappy and Alicia" carved into the tree at the air show

•  asking him when he first fell in love with Grandma, and him replying that he'd loved her ever since she was a little girl

• testing for aluminum cans with his pocket magnet

• feeding the wild rabbit that one summer

• all the good junk he brought me - the frying pan missing a handle turned bird bath, old desks for the teacher and my invisible students, a box of old ribbon from the cemetery where he volunteered and sheets of styrofoam for my "crafts"putting flags on veteran graves 

• sneaking in to the hospital when I was 2 and he was recovering from open heart surgery 

   

  He was my best friend. "Who's the bestest, Grandma?", he'd say every night. And she'd reply, "That's our baby."  Brian says that he now knows why I never lack self-confidence, haha.