My Pop is very sick. He has some kind of super nuclear fancy name disease that is part of the Parkinson's family. He was diagnosed with it about 3 years ago and it just gets worse each month. Hospice now comes in the mornings to do vitals and check on his bed sores. They have been so nice and very helpful. He has always been such a big part of my life. He has always been like a father to me. I lived with my grandparents for about 7 years, well until Mark and I got married, so we have a very special bond in a lot of ways. We also had a few fights and disagreements along the way too. He is retired from the Atlanta Police Dept., where he was a police officer and detective for a long time. He always worked so hard to provide for all of his family. His partner still comes to see him at least once a month. Pop can't talk anymore, he tries but you really can't understand anything he is saying.
When I go to see Pop with the kids, he smiles a lot. He doesn't try to talk much but he will laugh at them if they are being silly. Colton usually does a pretty good job entertaining. All three of my babies always kiss him on the cheek and tell him that they love him when we leave. I love that, it always makes me cry too. Pop has always been a bigger man and very tall. Now he is just skin and bones because he can't really eat. He chokes on almost every thing that Mema feeds him. The one thing he does get is the Ensure, and he does pretty good with that. I admire my Mema for all that she does for him, I know that she loves him with all her heart and that this has got to be so hard on her too for so many reasons. They have been married for 60+ yrs., that is a long time. Pop does a lot of sleeping too, which is hard to watch because he has always been such an active person. He had the routine all of my life. In fact, Mema and I always made fun of him because he never changed anything and he was so slow at every thing. It would take him forever to take a shower and shave. We used to sit in the living room and just laugh, we would be dressed and ready and already gone to the store before he would even come out of the bathroom. He also always slept late, I guess after all those years of working hard he earned that right. He would then fix a ham and lettuce sandwich and cheese crackers, go sit in the den and read the paper for what seemed like forever. I guess the most important thing is that he enjoyed it. After that he would go out in the yard and do whatever needed to be done. He would also go to my Mom's house and take care of her yard. He liked to be outside doing whatever he could. Lets just say Mema and Pop always had a well kept yard. It is funny how all of these things come back to me when I think about him.
He always kept Randy and I in the Summer. He would take us swimming every day and the one thing I could never understand was why he wore long sleeve shirts, pants and a hat. I remember thinking he has got to be burning up, but he would always tell me that he made him cooler. I don't know about that one but it worked for him. He also picked us up from school. He always had me a salad ready to eat and Randy got sandwiches. It was always the little things that we loved the most. He would make us do our homework first then we could play.
I got in lots of trouble for speeding and still do, but he would always surprise me outside and give me a pretty good lecture about it. He was also one of the slowest drivers ever, we used to laugh if there was a line of traffic he was usually the leader through town.
There are so many things that make him such a role model and special person to me. I could go on and on forever. I just love him so much and hate to see him going through all of this but at least he all of us to be there with him.
Today we went to visit Pop and Mema and even though he doesn't look like my Pop is supposed to, I took some pictures of him with the kids. I also made Mema take a few herself. She had to put on her lipstick first. She has always been a huge lipstick person.
I love my grandparents so much, they have always been there for me.
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