Death’s power is limited—
It cannot eradicate memories
Or slay love
It cannot destroy even a threadbare faith
Or permanently hobble the smallest hope in God
It cannot permeate the soul
And it cannot cripple the spirit
It merely separates us for a while
That is the only power death can claim
—No more
—Donna VanLiere
It was late when the phone rang. Kate and I both leaped for it at once. Kate got there first. I watched her face as the expression changed from tense concern to utter happiness.
“It’s a boy!” she shrieked. I’m a grandfather—we’re grandparents, I thought, my heart brimming. “She wants to speak with you,” Kate said, handing me the receiver.
“Hello, sweetie,” I said, “Congratulations. How’s my little girl?”
“I’m fine, Daddy. I’m perfect,” Hannah replied. Her voice sounded strong, full.
“Well, how’s our grandson?” I could hardly contain my joy.
“He’s gorgeous, Daddy, but he’s got Uncle Hugh’s feet,” she exclaimed.
“Oh my, bunions already?” I joked.
“No, but he is pigeon-toed…. Somehow they’re pretty adorable on him, though,” she laughed.
“Well, does the little fellow have a name?” I asked. There was a brief pause on the other end of the line.
“His name is Evan Robert,” she said softly. “After you, Daddy.”
Evan Robert had arrived! He weighed six pounds eleven ounces and was twenty-one inches long. He’s a beautiful pink baby with soft tufts of hair on each side of his head, causing him to look very much like a little old man with a terribly receding hairline. Hannah and her husband, Steven, live four hours away in a small town where she teaches the fifth grade and he works as a state trooper. Hannah is most definitely her mother’s daughter, from her shiny black hair to her melodious laugh and compassionate heart. It makes me smile to see the mirror image of the Kate I first met so many years ago. Lily is finishing her last year of college and since interning at my firm this past summer, has been threatening to pursue a career in law. She loves to goad her father. She says I could use a little competition. I’d started my own firm a number of years back, and we’d won a couple of fairly high-profile class-action suits. Lily is as blond as her sister is dark and a true beauty, a fact that she seems to be entirely oblivious to—even if, to my chagrin, the boys on campus are not. Now, Hannah was bringing the baby home for his first Christmas.
Kate has been sent into a tailspin, readying the house for her girls and her new grandson.
“Move that over there, Robert,” she says, only to change her mind a few seconds later, “No, move it back. It takes up too much room over there.” I can scarcely keep up with her as she drags me along, baking and cooking in the kitchen, running to the attic for decorations, and shopping for Christmas presents for the baby.
“Our first Christmas with our grandchild,” she squeals into my ear.
It seems what I’d always heard is true: You become a crazy person when you turn into a grandparent. Our refrigerator was already covered with pictures of Evan, smiling up at the camera from the tub, from the floor, from the crib, and from the car seat. Basically, it’s the same picture—just a different location each time.
When the car pulled up in the driveway this afternoon, Kate shoved me out of the way and rushed out the door, her arms waving high above her head. “Merry Christmas!” she shouted, making a beeline for the car. After a quick round of hugging and kissing Hannah and Steven, Kate gingerly scooped up the baby and lifted him high into the air.
“There he is!” she exclaimed. “There’s Grandma’s boy!” Hannah ran to me and planted a big kiss on my cheek before grabbing the baby’s bag off the backseat. Together, she and Kate made their way into the house, oohing and ahhing over the baby, closing the door firmly behind them. Steven and I just looked at each other and laughed.
“Well, Merry Christmas to you too!” I yelled toward the door. Glancing at my watch, I said, “Steven, since we’ll never be missed in there,” motioning toward the house, “how about riding with me to pick up Lily at the airport?”
When we returned, the house was aglow with the Christmas lights and decorations I had put up the weekend following Thanksgiving. Kate oversaw the whole production, yelling up to me on the ladder “Those lights are sagging too much” or “Robert, move the wreath over toward the center of the window a hair.” By the end of the day, the house was something Mother would have been proud of, complete with her yard sale Nativity lighting the front lawn. Lily burst through the front door, sweeping her nephew into her arms, gently tapping his small nose, exclaiming, “Look at you! Look at you!”
I pulled out the Dunhill Billiard and packed the cylinder bowl with tobacco that smelled like a forest of pine trees. I puffed on the plastic bit till the tobacco caught, flicking my right hand to put out the match. “Dad!” Lily whined. “Do you have to light that thing?” But Kate didn’t say a word. She never knew why I sporadically smoked the pipe, but she never asked either. All she knew was it had something to do with bringing me back to her. And that’s all she needed to know.
Evan giggled as Kate raised him high in the air, then brought him down toward her, sticking her nose in his round belly.
“Who’s Grandma’s angel?” she asked in a voice that, I imagine, alerted every dog in the neighborhood. “Who’s Grandma’s angel?” The baby laughed and gurgled, his tiny arms and legs wiggling in the air. Lily offered her finger for Evan to grab and proceeded to bounce his hand around like that of a tiny orchestra conductor, while Kate lifted him repeatedly up and down, up and down.
I sat back, puffing on the pipe, and smiled at what we’d become, a family, and wondered again what had happened to the small boy with the Christmas shoes who’d changed my life forever.