Day 13 - A Letter...



(This blog is supposed to be a letter to a person who has hurt me recently, but the nice thing is that I haven't been hurt by anyone recently, so this isn't directed to a person)

This is a picture of my Papaw, my son, my niece and my brother from last Easter (yes, my brother is holding a purse being funny because he used it to hunt easter eggs...I don't claim my brother is super cool or anything).



Dear Alzheimers,

You've stolen my grandfather from me, and I hate you. My Papaw is gone. There's a person who looks like him and sort of sounds like him when he can make intelligible sounds but my Papaw isn't there. And it's all your fault.
It's not fair for you to take away the greatest man I've ever known and turn him into the way he is now. A man who doesn't even remember my name, or anyone else's for that matter. My son deserved to know that man and he doesn't. The Papaw he knows is an old man who needs to be watched 24/7 to make sure he doesn't wander off or hurt himself.

My Papaw and I argued politics and world events. He would watch my tv shows for me and talk to me about them. He taught me how to drive a ridiculous old 70's car with rack and pinion steering so I would have the experience. A retired Air Force man, he went on to work for one of the space center contractors before retiring from that career. He was intelligent and women adored him. He was the flirt among all of the old ladies when he would go mall walking and he was full of stories about the trouble he would get himself into when he was younger before he married my grandmother.

He took me fishing and taught me how to bait a hook. He encouraged me to finish my degree and get a better job. He worried for me when I was pregnant because he could tell he was starting to leave us. He always told me to be good, and if I couldn't be good to name it after him (which I did, by the way - my son's middle name is my grandfather's name)...He would say "Take your time going but hurry back" everytime I left the house. And now he can barely speak. And again, this is all your fault because you've taken him from me. From all of us...

And right now, I don't know that I'll ever forgive you for that.




Comments

  1. AnonymousJanuary 15, 2011 at 10:14 PM

    awww, this is so sad. Alzheimers is such a sickening disease. This letter is beautiful though. Your papaw sounds like an amazing man!

    ReplyDelete

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