For most of my
growing up years, my family lived in Upstate New York. Dad was from Idaho, and
with his parents still there, Grandpa and Grandma Feickert were really my only
conception of what grandparents were.
The two of them made
for quite a pair. Grandma Feickert was so
generous, though that generosity frequently manifested in a questionable taste
in gift-giving. She was freely affectionate. And she always, always seemed to
be my biggest cheerleader. That’s just how grandmas were, and how they were
supposed to be, because that’s how she was.
Meanwhile, Grandpa
Feickert was hard working, organized, exacting, and in turn, so playful. He also tended to be the biggest
personality in the room. That’s just how grandpas were, and for all I knew, how
they were supposed to be.
One of my earliest
memories of Grandpa Feickert is from when I was five or six years old. We lived
in Oswego, NY, and Grandpa and Grandma lived in Baldwinsville. He was working
then as a salesman for the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB),
and one week, his scheduled sales calls meant he would be in the area. He was
going to visit us after work one evening! Over the phone, he asked me what I
might want him to bring me. And, with all my schooling in Saturday morning
cartoon commercials, I told him what I wanted most in the world: Donkey Kong
Crunch (cereal)!
I could hardly wait
the days until he came. And when his car finally pulled up, I leapt out the
front door to greet him, expectantly. With an excitement in his voice I have
never forgotten, Grandpa confessed that he couldn’t find the Donkey Kong
Crunch, but he’d instead brought me Pac-Man
cereal!
In that moment, I
could hardly have been happier. Grandpa had brought me cereal -- just what I
figured grandpas were supposed to do.
After Grandma and
Grandpa moved to Dexter, visits to their house became the things I most looked
forward to in the world. That had just about everything to do with Grandpa’s
willingness to let us use his equipment to fish off his dock, and to take us
out in his boat to fish and water ski. When we kids weren't fishing or
swimming, we'd play badminton on his net across the street. And Grandpa would
also find time to play Wiffle Ball -- a version in which he was the all-time
pitcher. All of this seemed to be part of what Grandpas were supposed to
do.
In the years we
lived in Ilion, NY, Grandma and Grandpa visited regularly, often around
holidays. For several years, when they stayed with us, they slept on an air
mattress and sleeping bags in the living room. Especially on Christmas morning,
we kids delighted in waking them up as early as we could get away with. Looking
back now, it must have taken an uncommon
amount of patience to let us wake them up. Grandpa would even sometimes even
respond with playful wisecracks -- the kind of wisecracks we figured grandpas
are supposed to give when their grandkids wake them up at 5 or 6 in the
morning.
It took me a long
time to figure out that there's not actually a manual or rule book for
grandpas. It took me a long time to realize that he didn’t have to do all those
things for us that he did. That he didn't have to spend as much time with us as
he did. That not everyone got to have a Grandpa Feickert. That he ever really
could have had any other role in life than to be my grandpa.
Grandpa was amazing
at so many things, but thankfully for the rest of us, he wasn't perfect. I
think it was common knowledge, at least among family, that he had a rather
infamous temper. [In fact, I think it's from Grandpa that I learned some of the
more colorful words in the English language -- usually after one of us
grandkids had gotten a fishing pole stuck or otherwise been less than careful
with his equipment!]
At one point,
though, while I was in college (and after he and Grandma had moved to North
Carolina), we were all visiting my family in Upstate New York. I remember
sitting in church with him during a discussion about fasting. As he held back
tears, Grandpa candidly shared that he had recently been fasting for help with
his temper, and that with God's help, he had gotten control of it.
I don’t think I had
ever heard Grandpa talk like that before. All these years later, what strikes
me about that experience isn't that Grandpa was probably a bit hasty declaring
victory over his temper. It's that my grandpa, then in his 70s, was still actively trying to overcome something that
was hard for him. He was still trying to improve himself. In my mind, that trying means everything.
Those who knew my
grandparents knew that, for most of the latter part of their lives, Grandpa and
Grandma were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And
for as long as I knew them, Grandma and Grandpa dedicated a great deal of time and
energy to their faith. But as dedicated as Grandpa was to his faith, and for as
much as he loved telling stories, I don't remember him being terribly preachy.
Grandpa's religion always seemed to be more lived, more practical, than
preachy.
From what I know of
Grandpa and Grandma’s faith, they believed in a loving and merciful God. They
believed that life does not begin at birth and does not end with death. They
believed that Jesus is our Savior -- that by following Jesus’s teaching we become
more like God (and hopefully happier people), and that through Jesus's
sacrifice, we would each be redeemed (our imperfections notwithstanding). Grandpa and Grandma believed that we would
all be resurrected. And that in the next life, we would all have the chance to
be with those we love.
Alfred
"Red" Charles Feickert, Jr., died on May 12, 2019. As my siblings
processed his passing, there were two recurring thoughts: (1) gratitude that
he’s no longer in pain, and (2) elation at the thought of him being reunited
with Grandma — that maybe she was waiting for him.
I want to believe
that latter thought of a happy reunion is more than just a comforting notion we
tell ourselves to cope with death. I sure hope I'll get to see him again, maybe
just to watch as he smiles and jokes his way through a game of Liar's Dice ("Bluffer's
Dice" in our house), or to hear him tell stories about his latest fishing
adventures. Or maybe even just to tell him one more time how grateful I came to
feel that, out of all of life's possible scenarios, I was one of the lucky ones
that got to have a Grandpa Feickert.
