RIP

There's really no good way to say this, so I'll just be blunt. My grandpa died this morning. It was a surprise and it wasn't. He had a stroke a couple of weeks ago, but we really didn't know how badly he was affected. Eventually, it was decided that he was going to go to Hospice which usually only means one thing. I think we'd all resigned ourselves to the fact that it was only a matter of time before he died. But every time he'd open his eyes, it raised everyone's hopes. Every time the phone rang, it set everyone on edge, thinking that this would be "the call."

The phone rang around 3:30 this morning. It was my uncle, telling us that Grandpa's body had finally given out. My mom woke me up before she left for work to tell me. I was still half asleep and the news didn't really hit me until I got out of bed a couple hours later.

Like I said, it wasn't exactly a surprise that he died. We all knew it was coming. But as terrible as I am with change, I am GREAT with denial. I think in the back of my mind I was still hoping he'd pull through this, even though it looked really bleak. This man lived through having skin cancer and colon cancer. He was 94 years old, still able to walk, still had all his mental abilities, still drove (of course, this could be a negative or a positive, depending how you looked at it).

He was actually my great-grandfather, my dad's grandfather, but it was easy to forget that. My dad's father died before I was born, so my great-grandfather was the only grandpa I knew on that side of the family.

I've been really lucky. Grandpa is only the fourth person in my family to die (while I've been alive) and, aside from my great uncle a few months ago, they've all basically died because of old age. Really, when you think about it, we were all lucky that Grandpa was so stubborn that he stuck around long enough after he had the stroke for most of the family to have a chance to say goodbye.

I don't know how much I'll be posting this week. There's family coming in from California and we don't know when any of the services will be yet. I think things will be pretty hectic for a while.

On the other hand, one of the great things about this blog is that it's a great diversionary tactic. I might start posting random thoughts and bits of information just to get my mind off things.