urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:killingvegans Phillip Phillip 2006-06-27T03:49:56Z urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:killingvegans:1758 2038-01-19T03:14:07Z 2006-06-27T03:49:56Z My Grandpa Walter Martin (on my biological mothers side) passed away on Friday. He was 86. His death is the end of a chapter, one left complete with unsolved problems, the conclusions never addressed, and pages ripped out in the next chapters after. <a name="cutid1"></a>It saddens me that I never got to spend much time with my grandpa. I never got to get to know him very well. There were things I wanted to ask, and things I wanted to do that I just never got around to doing. I kick myself for not picking up the phone and making a twenty minute drive. I wish my grandpa would have known that I thought about him often. His death will affect my sisters a lot more than it will me. Having lost people much closer, it is a feeling tantamount to unimaginable pain and destruction to never be able to have experiences with someone whom you've loved ever again. Old memories become jagged knives that stab and slash for a long time. It's as if life has forsaken you, leaving an empty shell of what once was behind. Every time a death occurs I become more desensitized, more reclusive. It affects me less. To quote Nietzsche, "That which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger." However, the closure that time brings is ripped open with the precision of a surgeons scalpel when you must face the coffin filled with your friends and family. After, when you appeal to reason and use your understanding of life's processes, after you get over the initial emotional shock and sort it all out, the loss stops being an obtrusive blemish. Death eventually seems so small when you've come to terms with it by beating it into a bloody pulp by thinking about it so much. There is an old saying: The dead take a long time to die. It's true to an extent. The reflection of death is something intimately human. Our position over nature necessitates the brooding of a process that other animals shrug off and continue on after. Death is functionary. Without death, life would be meaningless. In the end though, most memories of men dissolve into nothing. Our impact left on the objective world is often small and insignificant; yet, our effects on individuals are monumental, unsurpassed in the scheme of life. My grandpa was a good man. I was always amazed by the amount of knowledge he had in his brain. I remember making french toast, and talking about fishing (something I've never really done much of). His hearing problem brings a smile to my face. It was so stereotypical and rather comical of an old man: "HUH, SPEAK UP!" Then my Grandma saying, "You're going to have to speak louder, he can't hear you!" She would then yell whatever you said a few times until he heard. Another part of my childhood vanquished into thin air. I'll miss him. As grim as it is, I don't think my grandma will live much longer either.