19 Years Later

Last night, it suddenly struck me that it was 19 years since Grandpa Joe had passed away, and I nearly had forgotten. Next year, it will be two decades. And his great-grandson and namesake will be in kindergarten then.  Now he's nearly five years old.

That was already half of my lifetime ago, and it's nearly 105 years since he was born in 1908. How much the world has seen and changed in that century...automobiles and televisions and space travel and the internet. He would have marveled at little Joey taking everyone's pictures with a telephone, with a precision that I find very impressive for a boy only in preschool. It always amazes me at how much he reminds me of Grandpa.

That generation has faded. As I read my way through Hemingway, who was of the generation who served in World War I, very few remain who remember that time. No one survives who served. And someday my brothers and I will be the link that remains of those who remember him. Luckily, we will be there to tell stories and show photographs and he will probably be fascinated by his great-grandfather and want to know much more about him. He will see photographs and look for a resemblance in a smile, a recognition of a similar trait. He is a lucky boy to have that gift of a namesake.