My Grandfather

My family, my name.

Papa, my mother’s father, my Italian side, passed in November 2020. Today would have been his 91st birthday.

He and I were close. I loved him and still do. When he died, his rowboat became mine.

For his funeral, Papa requested his casket be rolled out of the church to Sinatra’s “My Way.” A very “Papa” song. After his funeral, it came on in my truck:

I had just lost my grandfather, but my biggest concern was the finicky bluetooth in my truck, the prospect of a few hours without Spotify. I scanned the radio for anything at all to listen to. Commercials, commercials, sports talk radio. Then, clear as anything, the outro—horns, strings, Sinatra drawing the song to its close: “Yes, it was my way.”

The song faded out. I pulled over and bawled.

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Common writing advice is show, don’t tell. Papa wasn’t a writer but lived by that. Maybe show and tell. He said plenty but lived what he said.

Early one morning he and I drank coffee, his in his John Wayne mug. We were going deep sea fishing. He got seasick for the first time in his eighty-plus years. I sat with him to make sure he was okay; he urged me to get up and fish.

Before we left that morning, he told me to notice what he was about to do. I expected a prank, par for Papa’s course, but he told me to pay attention, do in my life what he was about to.

He wrote a note to my grandmother saying we loved her and left it on the table for her to find. Walking past, he said something about little gestures making all the difference.

My grandparents were married six decades. Grandma passed a year before Papa. At her wake he told me through tears, she was my whole life. Between her death and his, he would bring a chair and sit at her grave.

When he was alive we drank Manhattans together, his favorite drink. I made Manhattans for everyone at his burial and used to make one for myself to remember him. Now I just put on Sinatra.

2018. Humoring their grandson at Wakodahatchee Wetlands. They weren’t birders, but there were lots of birds. Wood Stork, Black-bellied Whistling Duck, Tricolored Heron, Roseate Spoonbill, my first Prothonotary Warbler, many more.

Papa wasn’t perfect, but the common denominator across anything I do is I want to make him proud. He passed in 2020. Two years later my life changed. Navigating that change, I often wonder what he’d say. It’s not hard to guess: A quitter never wins, and a winner never quits.

People told him he’d never amount to anything. He proved them wrong. “When there was doubt,” Sinatra sings, “I ate it up and spit it out.” Papa graduated college, became a pharmacist, joined the army, and opened the ninth CVS. He had no shortage of stories about the army and that store.

When he was alive, if you were going to take a medication you asked Papa about it. Despite his medical knowledge, if you felt sickness coming on he’d tell you to drink some whiskey.

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Stubborn as he was, all it took was grandma’s emphatic Mike! to get him to do what she needed. When we reminisce about the two of them, somebody typically imitates her signature Mike!

He taught me to put Canadian nightcrawlers on fishing hooks. Fish would be attracted because they were worms, but the task was to make them look enticing. When we played checkers he never let me win, teaching me not to be a sore loser. He still wasn’t hesitant to celebrate—“and may I say, not in a shy way.”

One Christmas after his passing my family in Louisiana sent a king cake, a Mardi Gras tradition a few months early. A king cake has a plastic baby baked into it; if you cut the cake and find the baby it’s good luck. We took turns cutting it to see who’d get it. I went first. Right away, plastic baby. I celebrated as Papa would have, danced around and made lots of noise—not in a shy way. I keep that baby at my desk.

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Names

My first name, James, was my great grandfather’s on my mother’s side.

I’m lucky to have known him for early years of my life. He built his home in New Hampshire, was missing fingers from an industrial accident. When I was a boy he’d ask, What’s your name? I’d say James. That’s my name, what’s your name? I’d say James, he’d ask again, I’d keep saying James—not getting the joke.

His wife, Emma, grandmama, made cream cheese and olive spread I grew up eating, always with Ritz crackers. She was full of humor and lived to be 97.

For my 11th birthday I asked her to write me a letter about her life. She wrote eight pages in a leather journal.

This is an unusual request for an 11 year old boy to ask his Great Grandmother to write him a letter so he can remember her.

I keep that journal in my bookcase, that photo tucked between its pages. At 32, I’m glad I made my unusual request.

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My middle name, Anthony, comes from my father’s father, my Portuguese side.

He passed before I was born. I’ve heard stories and seen pictures. He liked to dance, play soccer, was nicknamed Shapika, and grew grapes to make wine.

Before my grandmother, his wife, passed in 2023, she asked to be buried in clothes she wore for their honeymoon. Last time she wore them, she said, she was going on a trip with Freitas. That’s what she called him. Now she was going on another trip with him.

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When I was 16 I was confirmed so had to pick a name.

James, grandpapa; Anthony, my grandfather; Freitas, “someone who lived on a patch of stony ground.”

Where was Papa? I chose Michael.

It feels fitting to have chosen his name while the others were given to me. I knew Papa best of the three; he knew me best. Alive for my confirmation, he reacted to me choosing his name how you’d expect an outwardly tough but truly sentimental man to react.

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We’re often given our forebears’ names, parents decide to honor their parents or grandparents. In picking Papa’s name, I decided.

With him gone, I have to imagine what he’d say or do, what he’d think of what I’m doing or not doing. I have an idea what he’d say; as for what he’d do, he might do many things. It’s easy to imagine he’d request some Sinatra.

“My Way” was his song. Other songs of Sinatra’s espouse Papa’s beliefs. “That’s Life.” If you fall flat on your face, get up, back in the race.

At some point, all of us will fall on our faces and have to get up. On our feet, we’ll assess goals, obstacles, allies—steps to take in order to move forward.

Eventually you’ll look back at all you pushed past: “Yes, it was my way.”

Rock & Hawk exists because people read it. Thank you. I mainly write about birds but wanted to write about my grandfather. My posts don’t start out behind the paywall, they end up there after a year. I’ve only paywalled one from the get-go and didn’t like it. If a paid subscription or one time contribution makes sense for you, the support means so much to me.