My paternal grandfather was born December 24, 1907.
He actually liked having a Christmas birthday...everyone celebrated it. I first learned the meaning of "surprise" on his birthday, too...the year I ran to the front door to meet him yelling "Happy birthday! We got you a shirt!"
As his first grandchild, though, I could do no wrong, not even by ruining birthday surprises. He spoiled me rotten, although the best thing he gave me was time. He retired when I was just a toddler and frequently babysat, and he never seemed to get tired of reading books to me, or taking me on walks, or using up rolls and rolls of Polaroid film.
He taught me about rocks (or gems and minerals, a distinction I learned quite young), the American Revolution, and poker. Anything I studied in school he knew more about than my teacher, and he'd take me down to his basement to help me look things up in a 1889 Encyclopædia Britannica (which I now have) anytime I came up with a question.
He died of lung cancer when I was 12, and I am ashamed to admit that he got sick around the time I because a self-absorbed adolescent and I didn't realize that he was dying until it was too late...there were a million things left to ask him that I never got to ask.
I think about both my grandfathers often, but especially this time of year around their birthdays. The chruschiki and the beigli, although Christmas cookies now, were their birthdays cakes when they were alive.
Posted by Nic at December 24, 2003 01:06 PM | TrackBack