My grandpa passed away peacefully early Thursday (3 am, Jan. 12) . His body finally just shut down. My grandma and mom stayed the night at the hospital that night. He had a brief seizure and the nurses woke them up. They got to go in and see him one last time. He died five minutes later with the two of them at his side.

Friends and family have helped out a lot. We have more food than we know what to do with. A lot of others have just stopped by to talk. The blood drive I spoke of below has gone great...more have donated blood than what he required, so people are simply giving in his name out of love.

The man who keeps track of such things at the blood center made a remark - "Another? I've never heard of Leighton Mcleod, but he must've been quite a guy." He was quite a guy. He wasn't a pillar of the community; he wasn't on billboards; he didn't reach out to people in big ways. He was just extremely friendly, and had a sharp mind. It was like he could remember everything that every happened to him. And as soon as he remembered something, he was telling someone about it. He could carry on a conversation with a sign post. A handful of stories would come into his mind when any little thing happened or was mentioned. If you were telling a story and he thought of something, you'd go ahead and take a twenty minute break.

He was always telling vivid stories about his early life farming, or his time in the military as a young man, or his 30+ years of service to Fayetteville Parks and Rec. maintenance. He would tell stories about how he had saved the city loads of money with his creative ways of doing things with the parks and playgrounds around town. Back when he was working, he would get so annoyed with some of the other guys he was working with - he would get annoyed when they didn't truly care about what they were doing. He took pride in everything he did.

He loved to hear Jeremy and I play the guitar. He also liked to hear me play the piano. He always wanted to play the guitar. His father played. He would tell us about how his dad could walk the bass line on the strings while playing. He'd show us how he would fingerpick, and tell us about the time another guy told his dad that he couldn't play without looking at his fingers. His dad took the bet, and, with guitar raised behind his head like Jimi Hendrix, continued to play. He also told us about the "bumble-bee" where you slide your finger all the way up a string to the end of the fretboard, then smack the guitar for a percussive noise. I also remember a story about the time one of his army friends played bar tunes on a piano so hard he broke it.

When he came over, I often wouldn't know. I would be playing guitar at my computer, and he would stand at the doorway, silent and listening, until I finally stopped. In November on Courtney's birthday (two weeks before he went into the hospital), I sang him the only old country song I know - Hank Williams' Your Cheatin' Heart. He was delighted. I might be singing a song at his funeral. I'd like to do something like that for him, but for me, it doesn't have to be at his funeral, or anything explicitly announced as 'for him' necessarily.

I'm not coming undone or anything. It's been such a long process. He missed out on Christmas, still in ICU. I think I'll miss him more around times I definitely would've seen him - Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, my birthday, others' birthdays. He was not as old as some, but at 72, he was old enough that I knew there was always a possibility of losing him to health conditions.

My only real concern is my grandma and mom. My grandmother especially - she does not let go of things well. She doesn't just see the glass as half empty. She'll mope about it, and let it stop her from carrying on normally. She had a terribly tough time when her other daugther passed away a few years ago. She blames herself for a brother's death in '57 because she was washed clothes on New Year's Day. I didn't even know that was a superstition. She grew up in a superstitious farming household with 9 siblings; she was the youngest. I hope she can put it behind her.

I've just remembered that he bought a guitar a few months ago at a yard sale. I think I'll fix it up.

(Thursday, January 05, 2006)

I dropped my car off at a shop last night. The guy couldn't fix it, so I had to pick it up early this morning. The gas light was on when I dropped it off; he had put a little in it this morning for me.

I left early for work - almost three hours early, in fact, to give Wal-Mart two hours to change my oil (which also needed to be done) before I had to be at work. Two miles down the road, the gas came back on and I immediately ran out of gas.

One lady was outside next door smoking as I got out of the car. As soon as I start walking to the house I pulled over at, she went inside and closed both the screen door and regular door. I understood that as "I'm not interested." Plus, I didn't feel like approaching a lone female who might be uneasy about a stranger. I spent a long time walking up and down the road knocking on seven other doors to try to find someone with some gas (in a gas can, say, for a lawn mower). No one was home.

Across the street, there was a gas can on someone's front porch with two gallons of gas.

Booya.

I was laughing a little inside. I put a gallon into my car, and tried to start it. (I left them the can, and eight dollars shoved in the door.) It wouldn't start. I was trying to get it fixed because it idles so hard that it knocks the whole car, shaking it. It takes a lot of gas to get it from idle to going. I punched the gas a couple of times, but because of the amount of gas it takes, nothing was happening - I didn't give it enough punches.

It made some bad noises as I ran out - I thought it might have just broken down instead. Anyway, I got out of the car to put the other gallon of gas in, in case I hadn't put enough in. Done. I went back to start it again.

Blast.

I locked my keys and my phone in the car. My key has also broken off in the ignition, so I have to crank it with a flathead screwdriver. The habit of taking the keys from the ignition and placing them in my pocket is thrown off because they aren't in the ignition - they're just sitting in the cup holder, with the screwdriver.

Despair has now taken over. I dropped my shoulders and hung my head (further). It's an odd feeling...what's happening is so ironic, and so unlucky that I'm waiting to wake up from this dream - I kind of want to laugh, I kind of want to cry, and I really just want to prop up against the car and take a nap.

I went over to the lady who went inside. She wasn't opposed to helping after all - she saw me coming and opened the door before I could knock. She smiled as if she had seen everything that had just happened. She asked if I wanted to use the phone, and I nodded. I called Emmy, and she rescued me. She laughed hysterically at my series of unfortunate events, and my desperate actions and reactions. I got some more gas from home, and it started up okay with repeated stomps on the gas pedal. I never made it to Wal-Mart.

I got to work at 4 (as scheduled). We're so backed up because of the Medicaid-Medicare shift as well as the usual early-in-the-month rush of Medicaid recipients from the poor demogrpahic of the store's neighborhood. Everything is way behind; the daily order didn't come; the minimum wait for prescriptions is four hours.

By 5, we had to shut down the drive-thru and no longer accepted prescriptions for the night - everything would have to be tomorrow, or taken elsewhere. I supposed to get off at 9; I stayed until 11 (an hour after closing) to just catch up for today. Tomorrow is going to be much worse.

But I'm off tomorrow.

And going to give blood at the hospital, and to spend my Barnes and Noble gift card on the Chronicles of Narnia boxset.

My grandpa has been in ICU at the hospital for almost four weeks. He had major heart surgery in the first week of December. He has required 37 pints of blood, but for every pint of blood given in his name, a pint is subtracted from his bill. Thus, 37 pints given in his name means no charge.

I got The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe just before Christmas; started reading last night. When I finish it tomorrow or Saturday, I'll go see the movie. I can't wait to see it. Great book.

en það besta sem guð hefur skapaðer nýr dagur
the best thing God created was a new tomorrow