My Grandfather In His Dying Days

My grandfather was a farmer. His clothes, plain grey or black cloth, were marked with the work and life of the farm. When he wasn't out in the fields he would sit by the fire, crooked nicotine stained fingers holding his pipe, or arranging his bob, quiet and seemingly lost in his thoughts. He threatened to trash us with nettles if we were ever caught climbing in the barns. We went quiet around him. One summer day during his final year, I noticed he was crying. Silently. Our mother asked us to run outside. I felt shocked, he was looking directly at me, but I could see in his eyes a kindness and softness I'd never noticed before. Something in me recognized this look as an inkling of the love he felt. I held his gaze for what seemed like a long time, but probably just the instant it took for our mother to shoo us out. As we left I heard him say "Evelyn, I miss the fields".

Even now, years later, I can still recall the startled feeling that seeing him like that gave me. I'd lived my whole young life up to then with the impression that to him we only provoked ill-temper in him, and were a presence to be tolerated, a nuisance at best. I knew he was going to die, as surely as I knew the summer would come to an end and we'd go back to our life in the city, and school, friends, street lights and the sounds of humming cars at nights. I didn't say it out loud, or even really think it, this knowledge seemed as intuitive as that of migrating swallows. And surely enough about a week or two after we'd returned to city life he passed away and we were back on the farm for the funeral.