Three Men, Three Memories

Lauren Janoschka

Ms. Asuncion

English 9 Honors, Block 3

30 September 2015

Three Men, Three Memories

Loving father and mother with a few children living in a quaint house in the typical suburban neighborhood. The family has a few pets; Perhaps they have a fish or a dog. Their grandparents might come and visit on the weekends, never far from their grandchildren. A perfect example of a perfectly normal family. 

This is my life, except for one thing. I have three grandfathers, yet I’m not sure what life would be like with one. I might have three, but in reality it’s almost like having none.

            My first grandfather is a man I’ve never met. I know him only by name and relation. Will Janoschka, father of Darin, Michelle, and Steven Janoschka, and former husband of Karen Davis. He could be tall or short. He could have dark brown hair like my father, or maybe a he’s a light blonde like my brother was when we were young. Maybe he’s broadly built like my father, or maybe more lean like my Uncle Steve. It’s all a mystery to me.

            Currently my grandfather lives in some remote area of Arkansas that, according to my parents, is much too secluded to ever try to visit. I have never visited him and he has never visited me. He probably never will. He’s never met me and he’s already made the decision that he doesn’t want to try visit me or even his own son. He separated himself from my family a long time ago and that made me so mad when I realized it.

            I harbored that anger for a while until I thought about it later. I can’t make him change his mind. If I had a way to I might have tried, but more than likely I would’ve been disappointed. My father made the decision to let his father do as he wished a while ago, and I had to respect that decision. Harboring that anger over something already decided wouldn’t change anything, so I decided to let it go. All that was left was a small bit of grief over a man I was supposed to love who would never give me the opportunity to do so. That was the first time I realized I was missing something.

My next grandfather is my mother’s father. A tall and willowy man with a very thick French accent. He immigrated from France in the sixties’ with my grandmother, and as a result was always more soft spoken then Americans. He always wore sweatpants and a t-shirt, was always practical, and was never found without his trusty walk-man. Serious doctor by day and loving father and husband by night. At least, this is how I imagine he was like.

            I never met Monsieur Daniel Dupourque. He died of a heart attack before I was born. Everything that I have of my grandfather fits in a box that resides in my closet. The box is mostly comprised of pictures and letters from him written during his youth in Saigon, Vietnam. In the box there was also his wallet and wedding photos. I love his wallet because it’s the last thing I found from when he was alive and it shows me what his day to day life was like. His wedding photos show me how he and my grandmother loved each other very much, a love I can only dream of finding.

            While I do love his wallet and wedding photos, his letters to my grandmother mean the most to me. One day, when I was looking for a tent in the storage room in my house I found a musty old box. Being the curious person I am, I opened it to find a box full of pictures and letters that my grandmother had saved. At the very top were condolence letters my grandmother saved from after he died. After a while of sorting through nearly one hundred condolence cards and letters I became extremely frustrated with the date stamp on the envelope, all reading 1998. I got so frustrated that I started tearing through the pile looking for anything that was not marred with the year 1998. When I finally found the pictures and the letters and I nearly cried I was so overjoyed. I spent a long while sitting on the concrete storage room floor deciphering the almost illegible French text. What I found on them made the tears finally come.

            I found letters he had written to my grandmother many years ago, telling of his daily life. While I found no fantastical stories of his life and adventures, what I found meant much more. His letters gave me a taste of who he was as a person, and who he was when no one was looking, and it made me understand him much better, a gift I never imagined I would be given. Those letters made me extremely happy but they also reminded me of something I would never be able to experience myself, only read and guess what it would’ve been like to meet such an amazing person. That was second time I realized I was missing something.

            My last grandfather is the only one I remember, if vaguely. He visited my family and I when I was little, maybe 6 or 7. I remember mousy salt and pepper hair, always fluffed up in a crazy way that made him look like a scientist. He had a round face and kind brown eyes that were always smiling at you. I don’t remember his voice too well but I wish I did. I remember bits of a rough but still very soft and warm voice. When I was little I loved his name, too. I always thought Larry was fitting for a man like him.

            The most vivid memory of him that I have is one of a dark night when I was young. He had come over to visit us and had decided that we needed to have a sock fight, as was tradition during his visits. My brother, sister, and I ran upstairs to get the sock drawer with an energy that only three six year olds could possess. We ran back down the stairs hauling our socks and then divided into teams. My dad and siblings grouped together and my grandpa and I teamed up. Then he hauled me up the stairs and the war began. We screamed and laughed, my grandfather and I sharing stolen giggles while we were hiding behind the stairs. He ended up getting the most hits off, while I acted as a distraction/sock collector. I remember his hugs and how much fun I had, just the two of us. Those are the times I’ll miss the most.

            I only met him two or three times, most of which I don’t remember. He never visited again after that sock fight. Years later my mom broke the news to us.

            “Grandpa Larry has leukemia, he’s in the hospital right now,” she told us.

            Being fairly young when she told me I didn’t understand the full extent of what she said. The only experience I had ever had with cancer was when my grandmother contracted breast cancer, and she was perfectly fine after a few surgeries and some chemotherapy. My mom explained to my siblings and I about how he had to under-go a bone marrow transplant and they weren’t sure it was going  to work.

            After that there was a period of no news, so I assumed he was fine. I finally realized the severity of his condition a few months later when I overheard my parents talking about him.

            “ICU…Not much time... Are you going to fly out?” I only heard my mother in bits and pieces.

            “Whole family will be there… Take some time off of work,” my dad said in reply.

            A week or so later my dad was on a plane to Michigan to be with his family. Days later, when he came home, he delivered the news. Grandpa Larry had died peacefully in his sleep. I don’t think I really comprehended what that meant then. As far as I knew, cancer didn’t take people. I hardly remembered my grandfather anyways, I don’t believe I even realized who he was. So instead of doing anything I quietly went back up to my room and continued with my daily routine.

            It was only months later that I realized just exactly what had happened. It was at a Christian summer camp during the summer before eighth grade. At this camp we did a youth talk every night about God and Jesus and how they play a role in our every day lives. I am not very religious so I didn’t take much of the speaker’s words to heart, but they were very interesting presentations so I always listened to them. The one part I took to heart was the speaker’s words about our loved ones and how they play an important role in our lives, and she asked us to think about all of our loved ones who we missed. I’ve had an extremely lucky and amazing life, and I have not had to experience the loss of loved ones very much, so I had to think hard about what she said. I don’t know what it was about that presentation, but something finally clicked in my mind. I remembered the sock fights and the stolen smiles. I remembered his mousy salt and pepper hair, and I finally realized that he was well and truly gone. That was the final time I realized I was missing something. I was missing my grandfathers.

I went back to the cabins with a heavy heart, and I stayed up the entire night thinking about my grandfathers. I cried, I laughed, I smiled, and I cried a little more. So many emotions ran through my head that night. I was so angry at my father’s father for not wanting to meet me, I was heartbroken that I would never get to make more memories with Grandpa Larry or make any memories with my mother’s father. I want to say that I am happy about it now, that I got over my sadness and realized how lucky I am, but I didn’t and I probably won’t. They were taken from me long before I ever had a say about any of it and it is so unfair, but isn’t all death? Death will never be fair. It’s random and its terrible and it takes the best people this world has to offer. I am just a girl, I can’t control death, I can’t stop it. The only thing I can do is realize how lucky I am that I didn’t have two tries, I had three.