Growing up I spent a lot of time with my grandpa – Harvey Lee Sasser. He took the time to teach me to read and worked with me when it became apparent my stuttering was more than just a small problem. He taught me there's nothing better than the truth and that like it or not, you have to trust people until they prove otherwise.
We spent mornings, afternoons and evenings either in his backyard on Pin Oak or on his back porch on Foxglove. During that time we'd watch my grandma's current chihuahua run around the back yard believing it was the largest beast for miles around. He would share stories of his childhood, of him sitting in a school house upset with himself because his father was out there working hard to support the family and he wasn't, so he decided one day to not return to school and instead go to work with his father. About how he had entered a small German town with his troop where everyone had been gunned down before they arrived yet he came upon a family in hiding and sat and shared his rations with them. About how he slept in a trench with nothing above him but the night sky for protection and how he jumped from train to train to get home after he returned from the war. About how he and his sons-in-law would go fishing together – and how good of a fisherman he was compared to them!I am very thankful I am easily amused by a good story and that even when he would tell me a story for what seemed like the hundredth time, I treated it like the first. He used those stories to share life lessons with me as a child and even as a young twenty-something, when he forgot more than just who I was, those stories and their lessons were still relevant to me.
Remember to share your life stories with those around you; they very well may help mold them.
3 comments:
:{ Sad I wasn't around enough!! I remember grandpas stories like they were yesterday!! Lol my mom used to tell me I would call grandpa "daddy" because she did!!! He certainly was the best grandfather in the world!!! My father was alot like him!!!
You know it's funny that you say that about you calling him "daddy", but I was thinking about how all his girls always called him that. It wasn't ever dad or pop or anything else, it was always daddy.
Another thing I miss is how he brought his daughters together. They still get together every once in a while, but not like they used to. He was certainly a force for good in our family!
He definatly was an extraordinary man!!! He was one in a million!! Men like that these days are few and far between!!! So here is the "Daddy" story. My mom and Grandpa have told it a thousand times!
Grandma and Grandpa were visiting California. My Mom, Grandpa, and I went to the store. I was in one of those umbrella strollers. Grandpa was pushing me through the store. I called him "Daddy". Grandpa told me no I am your Granddaddy! So I proceeded to yell "My Graddaddy" throughout the store!
Funny how those stories mean so much!
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