When I Was Short

There was an old man who lived in our motel in room #6. He walked with a sideways slouch, one arm clenched in a permanent fist that swung useless by his side and a sturdy wooden cane clutched in his good hand that helped his bad leg to keep tempo with his good leg. My Mom explained to me that he had suffered from a stroke and that is why his body didn’t work right. He had silver hair that he kept neatly trimmed and greased back with VO5 styling gel, and he smelled like the pink colored wintergreen candies that he kept by his bed in a clear plastic ten pound bag. I called him Grandpa Terrio.
Everyday after kindergarten, Grandpa Terrio would sit in our kitchen and stamp his cane impatiently while I performed my daily chore of putting away the clean dishes that had dried in the counter dish rack. Once done, he and I would head off to the local restaurant called “Joyce’s Cafe”. There he would order a butterhorn with coffee and french fries and a coke for me. We would sit at the end of the counter by the till and Grandpa Terrio would converse with the “regulars” who sat so often at the counter that they seemed a permanent fixture of the Cafe. I would munch happily on my french fries, dipping them delicately into the ketchup that Grandpa Terrio had squirted onto my plate and watch the menagerie of faces as they played out a symphony of slurping coffee, sucking down cigarettes and jawing about local gossip and little injustices that they faced in their small worlds.
One day a man came in with a big camera. It looked like the kind of camera you saw reporters on T.V. scurrying around with snapping pictures and blinding their hapless victims into blank eyed surrender with the huge cylinder flash case that housed a 3 inch flashbulb.
I have a dim memory of the camera man’s face. He was young with dark hair that was slicked down and flipped to one side. I vividly remember him staring at me from the other end of the counter and gently teasing me trying to get me to look up and into the direction of his camera. The “regulars” at the counter added their gentle ribbing along with the camera man. I was painfully shy and despised their attention but managed to break out of my shell for a moment to grin at their good natured antics. The camera flashed a few times and the camera man murmured his approval. The “regulars” nodded their heads in similar approval than returned to their consumption of coffee, cigarettes and gossip, and happily, I to my french fries and coke.
Grandpa Terrio had a hobby of collecting pebble size rocks and polishing them. He and I would go for walks always looking downward for a pretty new stone to add to his collection. I would walk along side him holding his twisted lame hand and pick up any pebble that Grandpa Terrio would jab at in approval with his cane. He made cute little wooden rocking chairs and cemented the polished stones to the back and sides. The rocking chair had dowels on the sides that held spools of thread and and a drawer under the seat to hold sewing gadgets. The seat of the rocking chair was stuffed so one could use it as a pin cushion. I still use one of his rocking chair creations to this day..
Rainy days we spent together in my parent’s kitchen piecing together various puzzles. We never worked on children’s puzzles. Only the 5,000 piece ones that were made for adults to labor over. He taught me how to find all the straight edged pieces first to make the outline and then how to separate the pieces by color. I was proud that he respected me enough to include me in something labeled “adult” when I was only 5.
Sometimes, when the season was right Grandpa Terrio and I would go blackberry picking. Grandpa Terrio seemed to pride himself in knowing all the keen places where only the ripest berries grew. Only the biggest and juiciest would do. That pride was one day his downfall.
It was a beautiful summer day when Grandpa Terrio and I headed out to pick some Blackberries. He knew about a patch of particularly juicy berries about a mile down Highway 99 that ran along side my parent’s motel. We armed ourselves with buckets and headed down the Highway. Grandpa Terrio was right. The berry patch was full of the ebony colored berries and we had a grand time of filling our buckets and ourselves with their plumb juiciness. It was getting late and our buckets were brimming over with our berry booty, when Grandpa Terrio spied the “Mother lode”.
The berry patch we had been plucking our delicious loot from lay on top of a grassy ravine. It sprawled all the way down the ravine, but the only access was on top of the ravine. Grandpa Terrio had picked his way to the edge of the ravine and had spied the “Mother lode” hanging on a vine just over the edge. Using his cane he snared the “golden” vine and gently pulled it towards him. Just when the prize was almost in his grasp the allusive vine slipped off of the cane.
I watched in horror as Grandpa Terrio lost his footing and teetered over the edge of the ravine. I grabbed hold of his shirt and tugged him backwards toward me. All ready off balance his feet flew out from beneath him and he landed with a crash, flat on his back beside me!
I was glad that he hadn’t fallen down the ravine, but I was scared because he had hit his head pretty hard when he fell backwards. I sank to my knees beside him and patted him on his chest staring earnestly into his face to see if he was alright. He seemed a little stunned but reassurred me that he was o.k. He said that he needed my help to stand up because of his bad arm and leg. I tugged with all my 5 year old strength on his frail, age spotted hand, but I was too small and weak to pull him up. I tried pushing down on the toe of his shoes but that didn’t work either. My heart was pounding frantically and I felt like crying when I saw a trickle of blood run down the side of his head and onto one of his ears.
Grandpa Terrio looked me in the eye and told me quietly that I needed to run home and get help. I nodded my head. I would do it. He didn’t ask me if he thought I could do it. I saw the calm assurance in his eyes that he knew I could. Even in need he never patronized me. He respected me. I would rather have died than let him down.
I ran as fast as I could down the side street that the berry patch grew along than stopped when I came to Highway 99. There were 4 lanes. 2 going northbound and 2 going southbound. Cars whipped by me traveling in both directions. I remembered my Mom teaching me how to cross. She had taken me by the hand and showed me how to look both ways up and down the highway before crossing. She had practised with me crossing back and forth and then had stood on one side while she watched me cross on my own.
She wasn’t there to watch me this time. It was up to me. Grandpa Terrio counted on me. I looked left than right. Too many cars. I looked left than right again, still too many cars. My heart was racing and I could hear my ragged breathing mixed in with the sound of the cars zooming by me. Left, than right. Too many cars! I would never be able to cross! Suddenly a Semi-truck pulled up along side me. The driver looked down at me and then forward at the speeding traffic.
“When I tell you to, you run as fast as you can and cross the road, ya hear?” He bellowed down at me.
I nodded my head and waited for my cue.
“Run!” He yelled.
I took off running the sound of my sneakers slapping the pavement in sync with the frantic pounding beat of my heart. I flew across Highway 99 than sped onward towards home. The run to my home was uphill. My parents motel was named after that hill. “Hilltop Motel”. I kept my eye on the top of the hill knowing once I reached it I would be home. I reached the top in record time. As I rounded the corner of our driveway I saw my Mom standing by a lady who was climbing into a car. They both froze when they saw me running towards them. I gasped out the Grandpa Terrio had fallen in the blackberry bushes. I told them where and they took off in the lady’s car. I stood there gasping for air watching the car disappear down the road.
I found out later that day that the lady who drove my Mom to where Grandpa Terrio had fallen was Grandpa Terrio’s daughter. She visited him once a month. Mom said it was so she could borrow money when Grandpa Terrio got his Social Security check. I don’t know if that’s true but if so, I guess we were lucky that day that it was the first of the month.
Grandpa Terrio was fine. He had a big bump on the back of his head and a small gash by his ear. I went to see him in his room that evening. He was standing in his kitchen holding a wet towel to the bump on his head. He seemed embarrassed to see me. I think it hurt him to let me see him when he was weak. He mumbled that he was alright and that I should go on home. I was a little hurt that he wanted me to leave, but I understood his need to save face. I turned around and left giving him the respect that he had so often given to me.
One day, not long after, when I was standing on top of the stool in the kitchen putting the clean dishes away, my Mom walked into the kitchen and told me quietly that Grandpa Terrio had died. I stood frozen with a plate in one hand and and towel in the other. I watched my Mom turn and walk into the living room and then out the front door. I calmly opened the kitchen cupboard and put the plate inside. Numbly I finished putting the rest of the dishes away, all the while I kept wondering why I wasn’t crying. I blinked my eyes in disbelief, but they felt oddly dry and scratchy.
The next day my family went to the funeral home to “view the body”. My brothers and sister were freaked out at the sight of Grandpa Terrio in the casket. My sister shoved me forward and pressed me against the casket. My brothers teased me and said that Grandpa Terrio was going to jump out of the casket at me. My sister kept trying to get me to poke the body. My oldest brother got brave enough to pick up the maroon tie that Grandpa Terrio was wearing.
I didn’t touch him. I didn’t say a word. I thought he looked nice in his grey suit white shirt and maroon tie. His hair was trimmed and combed back nicely as I knew he would have liked it. The funeral person had placed Grandpa Terrio’s lame hand to rest across his stomach. It made him look dignified. I stared at that hand remembering it as the one I had held so many times on our walks. I desperately wanted to reach out and touch it one more time, but I was afraid that my brothers and sister would poke fun at me.
Later we attended Grandpa Terrios funeral in a little wooden chapel. My Mom kept the booklet that we received at the front door. I guess it was a bulletin like the one you got at church that told you what was going to happen during the service. I don’t remember the service, only that I sat on a wooden pew and stared at my shoes. I watched as I swung first my right leg and then my left. I remember that I didn’t cry. Years later my Mom asked me if I remembered Grandpa Terrio. She said she remembered that I had cried for a week solid after the funeral. To this day I don’t remember shedding one tear.

Haphazardkat
@copyright 2005