grampa

the first 9 years of my life were lived about 75 yards from their house. all of my earliest memories seem to center around the hub of grandma and grampas house. the first time i rode a bike grampa was there. when i learned how to play basketball it was because grampa put up a hoop on his garage. when i fractured my jaw and had to go to the hospital for stitches, grampa went with. i spent hundreds of hours in the maple tree in their front yard. i spent countles hours under the cave created by the overgrown arbivida. when grampa went to cut wood for the wood stove, i went with him. when he went to get his hair cut by the juggling barber, i went with him. when he dug a new water line for the well, i dug with him. the sound of the bell at the front door still rings in my ear and there is only one house in the entire world that has the welcoming smell of g & g hoyt's. i can still smell the unique smell of coffee mixed with the personal smell that is created when one lives somewhere for a long time, not of old people, but of home. i loved watching grampa pour cream into his coffee and it would cloud up. i still love pouring cream into my coffee and watching it cloud up. grandma always had a bag of marshmallows tucked away behind some pots on the bottom shelf of the kitchen cabinets so that we could reach them easily, even though we thought it was a convenient oversight of grandma's. grandma taught me how to play dominos, grampa taught me how to play checkers and the patience. for a checkers genius to let a 5 year old win is something. i loved sitting in the living room red cheeked at christmas because the wood stove was stoked and it was 90 degrees inside even though it might have been 6 degrees out. this past year i had the opportunity to stop by for supper at g & g hoyts while on my way through for business. we had gotten slowed by snow and by the time we got there it was 8 in the evening. you would have thought we were right on time and supper had just been taken from the oven. there is no other place that i feel as welcomed as at g&g's house. from the cookies, to pudding on a cloud, to the secret stash of marshmallows or an orange juice jar that never runs out. to the creak of the old aluminum screen doors whose sound has been permanently etched into my mind, to the pictures on the wall of the hallway, where each year my latest school picture would be proudly displayed among several other siblings and cousins. i wish i could live closer to g&g they arent getting younger and it seems as the days draw to an ever speeding close one wants to hold on ever tighter. i miss grampa and grandma. i miss running over to their house and barging in to show grandma the snake i just found in the back yard or sitting up in the maple tree looking across the field with grampa's binoculars till it was time for supper. i miss the smell of the sandy ohio soil littered with acorns along the trail back to the shed. i miss ringing the bell as i walked in the door only to be met with a hug and a hearty "well hello there david" as if i hadn't been there for years. i wish i could have coffee more often with grampa and have him tell me stories of years gone by and of solutions to todays ailments. i wish i could hug grandma at least once a week and let her bustle about the kitchen preparing a snack or a feast as if it were just for me. i would love to be young once more to lay in the living room and listen to the time life record company's classic western collection as i did in my youth. I can still hear the words of tex ritter "do not forsake me oh my darlin" i have no idea why, but i would lay on the floor and listen to those records all the way through. when i hear paul harvey i am instantly transported to g&g's house where grandma would tune in every afternoon to hear "the rest of the story" I remember when i carefully hid a tinker toy contraption on grampa's side of the bed under the covers and him asking me with a smile the next day if i knew anything about the pokey contraption he layed down on the night before. i started wearing a cap the other day, i think it looks good on me and is unique it happens to be an old style golf hat. the same kind that grampa never left the house without one on his head. i dont know if i like it because i think it looks good or because i think it makes me a little like grampa. ive been thinking about interjecting "well fiddle" and "whatchamacallit" into my daily vocabulary because i love the sound of it when grampa says it. some kids grow up and don't have such fond memories of their grandparents or don't have any memories at all and i am sad for them. i have so many great memories it fills my heart with warmth as i think on them. i hope some day i am a grampa like my grampa hoyt it is a goal that i aspire to. he didnt have to take me to the juggling barber, but he did. he didn't have to put the hoop up but he did. he didn't have to do any number of the countless things he did for this guy in his early years but he chose to. i am so lucky, more than most even. i remember when grampa asked dad to cut his wedding ring off, not because he had given up on grandma but because it had been years since he had even been able to get it off and he was worried it was cutting off circulation and he woul lose his finger. That is how my wedding ring will be when i am 70. i love whenever i would exclaim about some new discovery or creation "thats awesome!" grandma would chime in "no, God is awesome" grandma thank you for always having a hug for me and for creating the most welcoming place i know, a place where no matter how infrequently i visit, always feels like home.

grampa, thanks for being an example, thanks for being available, thanks for teaching me so many things, thanks for hauling me all over with you when i was young. i can think of no greater display of love and care than to let a preschooler tag along and be with his grampa.

I didnt really realize it till i started writing my thoughts but i miss you both so much. I wish i could visit more and i wish i would have done all my growing up closer. I wish i could be there to celebrate with you. I love you both very much