PAPA

He's been on my mind a lot lately, although he's been gone forty years. He was my maternal grandfather, but he was "Papa" to us.

My father didn't stay, so I never knew my other grandparents, and my grandmother died when I was three, so Papa was a big part of my life, my father figure, my mentor, my friend. We watched baseball, the Three Stooges, and the Mercury launches together, and he taught me how to pound a nail straight.

Papa worked as a janitor at a bank...he'd worked in the steel mill, but had to retire in '48 due to a stroke. He had another one when I was ten, and had to be moved to a nursing home, where he died just after I turned thirteen.

I looked in the mirror recently, and got a shock...I look a lot like him. I love you, Papa.