Close this Window Tale #1: Passing Through Tale #2: Two Dreams Tale #3: Granddaddy & Me Tale #4: Three Days at Sunset Tale #5: My Father's Promise

Two Dreams & Other Tales Tale #3: Granddaddy & Me (excerpt) An Overwhelming Loss Michigan, May 2003   I sat looking out the window of the car as we passed the city limits. This wasn't just a leisurely car ride into the country for me. It was my passage into a scary and uncertain future. A couple hours earlier, I watched and listened as our pastor eulogized my parents, Johnny and Emily Truslow, and committed them to God and to the earth. It had been a week since a fire claimed the two of them and our house, leaving me orphaned and homeless at eleven-years-old.   My mother's parents, Mr. & Mrs. Garrett, sat in the front seats. Though they were family, they were strangers to me. I had met Grandma Betty briefly two or three times over the years, but had never so much as laid eyes on Grandpa Henry. I didn't know my Truslow grandparents or any of their family, who didn't even attend the funeral. As I understood it, the two families were like the Montagues and Capulets. Marrying against their parents' wishes made Johnny and Emily outcasts to both families. But, unlike Romeo and Juliet, they didn't express their love for one another by killing themselves. Instead, they raised their son--my name is Kevin, by the way--as devoted parents. I loved them dearly and the pain and fear I felt over losing them ran deep.   One matter requiring a quick resolution was finding a place for me. I no longer had a home or parents, no siblings, and no other close family. It seemed I would become a ward of the state and a citizen of the foster care system. But then Betty Garrett came on the scene and declared to the child welfare people that her only grandchild would not be raised by strangers. She was taking me home with her and that was all there was to it. The social workers had no issue with that and readily agreed. Now I was sitting in her car, being driven away from the only home I ever knew. However, I was not so young or naive that I didn't catch on to one simple truth: my grandfather was not at all happy about the new arrangement.   As the Detroit city skyline faded from sight, I felt a strange sense of doom. I was a city boy who had never been to the country before, much less lived there. The Garretts lived about two hours northwest of Detroit in a small rural town. My grandfather grew up there before moving to the big city as a young man and becoming a career firefighter. After retirement, he moved back to his hometown. His wife, Betty, was a Detroit native like me and had once undergone the same change of scenery. ***   I had fallen asleep and was jarred awake when the car door opened beside me. Standing there was my grandmother, her smile warm and welcoming. "Kevin, we're home," she said. I sat there frozen, unable to move. "You don't want to come out?" I still didn't respond, so after a minute, she closed the door again.   I could hear my grandparents' muffled voices outside the car, but could not make out what they were saying. Presently, the trunk opened and Grandpa Henry began unloading luggage. The door on the other side opened and Grandma Betty climbed in beside me, pulling the door shut behind her. She was silent for a minute, then looked at me with a mixture of sadness and concern on her face. She had just lost her daughter and now had a grief stricken grandchild to deal with. Text Copyright, G. S. Treakle, 2023