So today I visited my grandparents. I've been here at my parents' all week and the grandparents live five miles away, so it was a nice day to each lunch and visit them and my aunts while enjoying a very nice early spring day. We were sitting around outside drinking coffee and the topic came to books. It reminded my grandfather to show me a short story that he said he wrote last night around 3am. He is 82 years old and I have never heard him talk about writing besides a memoir that he has been working on for years. He paints, he is an incredible draftsman, and he is great in the workshop, so I suppose it follows that he writes too.

The story was short, but it was very touching in it's simplicity:

The narrator is a graduate student waiting for his girlfriend in a burger joint. As he is waiting, he sees a much older gentleman enter and carefully pick a booth with two names written on the wall. The narrator people watches the older man and he sees an older woman walk in, recognize the man, and sit down. The narrator is able to follow the conversation and it happens that both parties have families with children and grandchildren. They laugh and share memories, and the narrator notices both of them have class rings on. They part ways and then the narrator goes to the booth and sees the writing on the wall says "george and lillian forever". The narrator then realizes that he has also written his own name and his girlfriends in HIS booth. The girlfriend then shows up and the story ends.

Now, I thought it was incredible that my grandfather was able to write this after having a long life, a marriage over 50 years and counting, 4 kids and 7 grandkids. I picture him reminiscing about his life in front of his computer at 3 in the morning, knowing he is in the twilight of it all. I wonder if there was an old college girlfriend he was thinking about when he wrote this? To me, he was trying to tell the readers that same sentiment that john lennon was saying when he sang "life is what happens when you're busy making other plans".

I'm really glad he shared this with me.

Lately I have been wondering (or have been haunted) about the probability of being old, living a comfortable life but not living with the greatest love of your life. I imagine it like been a constant buzz inside your head, telling you that no matter what you achieved, you still failed at life.

"When a man comes to die, no matter what his talents and influence and genius, if he dies unloved his life must be a failure to him and his dying a cold horror." - John Steinbeck in East of Eden

That's a sad sentiment, HB. I am scared to death of that as well.

I envy my grandfather who is very much in love with his wife, even 50 years after he married her. You can see it in everything he does for her, and how much he does for his family. He is a very good man, and he's lucky to have met my grandmother.

That is pretty depressing HB.

the part you said about the constant buzzing reminds me of 'white noise'

It reminds me of my refrigerator.

What reminds me...

Cutie story. Do things like that happen in real life? I don't think so.

If only life were like a romantic and nostalgic short story written by Reid's grandpa. *siiiiiigh*
Ok, well....yes things like that do happen.

My ex's grandfather got remarried at 81 yrs old after his wife of 50+ years passed away. To? His old high school sweetheart, whose husband had passed away as well.

And then there are stories like my great grandmother Maude Robinson, whose husband passed away suddenly when my grandfather was a toddler, and she vowed to never remarry. And never did. Her reasoning was that when she got to heaven she didn't want more than one husband waiting for her.

tl;dr

It does

I didn't read anything in this thread.

my mother won't ever marry another man since dad died because she said it was a 23 year long love affair and she can't wait to get back to him in the afterlife to pick up where they left off.

That's a sweet story too.

pics or it didn't happen