I miss him more than normal today. Memories flood my brain, so that I feel like if I were to tilt my head, they would spill out all over the floor I just cleaned. Memories of swimming in his pool on the hottest August days that I can remember. Memories of "boxing" with him, but he'd never throw a punch. He'd just block my innocent six year-old hands until I fell asleep in his open arms. Memories of watching Mariners games. And he, somehow, made baseball seem less boring. Yep, today I miss my grandpa a whole lot. And there went the neatly boxed and organized memories I had kept in my brain, spilled out all over the paper.
The worst part is, he's not even dead. Nope, he's alive and breathing. The thing is, my grandpa, my friend, was made into a vegetable by a violent stroke. My healthy, fun, loving grandpa, reduced to an emotional and physical mess. And I miss him. It hits. The guilt of missing him. Oh, how relative stomache pains are! Just a paragraph ago, my brain was filled with a memoir that made my evening. Now, like a volcanic tumor, my stomache acid boils with the discovery of the fact that I really miss him. How dare I feel pity for myself when he had EVERYTHING taken away! How dare I even wish that the stroke had never occured! How selfish am I, to feel cheated, when he was cheated out of ten healthy years of his life! But still, despite the guilt, I can't help but want him back. Like how it used to be. So, grandpa, here's your respectably disgusting memoir: I'll swallow the stomache acid creeping up my throat, and I'll miss you.