those of you who know me or read my blog regularly know that i was very close with my grandfather growing up and that my grandfather now suffers from alzheimer's disease. he has lived in a nursing home for about three or four years, i think.
the years have sort of escaped me because, as you also may know, i rarely visit him for my own personal reasons that only i can wrestle with. i hope it doesn't make you think less of me as a person. it's really a lovely place, as far as nursing homes go, and the staff is (apparently) wonderful, but every time i go there, i inevitably end up running out in tears, so for the most part the only times i see my poppo are when they bring him out to special family events or just to visit. he can't be out too long because he starts to get antsy and uncomfortable. people with alzheimer's do not like to be far from home, and that place is his home, now.
once upon a time he lived with me. or rather, i lived with him, my grandma, my aunt, and my mother. it was a happy home, if somewhat filled with grown-ups. i remember being small and sitting at his desk. i don't think i ever knew what it was he did at that desk. maybe it belonged to my mother or my aunt, but i associated it with poppo because he was the one with all the papers. he had so many papers and letters, stacked and wrapped with rubber bands, on the desk, in his dresser, and in the drawers of his bathroom.
then there were the pens. there were pens everywhere. he seemed partial to black pens cinched at the waist with silver rings and with a sliver clicker at the top. i loved those pens. i would sit at the desk and play all the time. my favorite things to do were to write words and draw (poorly) on legal pads and envelopes, swivel around in the old 70s desk chair that was upholstered in marigold, and press the buttons on the fluorescent desk lamp on and off over and over again. this may not sound fun, but there was something i liked about the way the lamp buzzed loudly and glowed softly if you pressed the button lightly, but then went into a quiet hum and bright glow when you really gave it a good, hard press.
the more i think about this, the more i am starting to understand my unreasonable fondness for office supplies.
anyway, i thought of poppo today as i looked online for a vintage desk lamp to go on the desk i rescued from the streets of echo park. the desk is old, cheaply made wood painted a 70s shade of peachy-pink. i hope to fill the drawers with pens and paper goods and use its surface to write all the things i will never get to show my poppo. he is alive and full of love in his heart, i know this, but he is not with me as i wish he could be. when i'm at my grandma's house, where his dresser still stands, i feel like i can almost see him shuffling about from desk to drawer, stack of papers in hand. sometimes i really do have to take a second look to really know he's not there. it scared me the first time. it frightened me that i could see this ghost, while he is still very much (thankfully) alive.
now i just think of it as a moving memory. a beautiful memory, like the kind that comes to you from the scent of jasmine on a summer breeze, only mine is more like the smell of aging paper and the gentle drone of a fluorescent bulb.