The Davie Diaries: I love you Grandpa

My sweet sweet grandpa passed away a couple of weeks ago. It's been such a surreal experience for me. It's weird to loose someone you see often, but not every day. Someone who has been a constant part of life for 33 years. Even when I lived in Utah or when Tim and I lived in San Diego, my grandpa would call to check on me/us and was always interested in what was going on. When we were going on a trip he would always call to see if we had left yet. He paid attention to my kids and loved them. He had the sweetest relationship with Jack and was always super happy to hold him when we got together for Sunday dinners at my parents house. He bore testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ and expressed his pride in his family. He was always pleasant to be around and was never an Eeyore, even when life was hard or his health wasn't that great. He filled a very large place at the Sunday dinner table and his absence is really going to be felt.

Three weeks ago (on a Saturday), he slipped in the bathroom while his wife was gone. He laid there for two hours waiting for Joan to come home. He said while he was laying there he was thinking about how Joan took such good care of him. The ambulance took him to the hospital and he found out that he had a broken femur. We all went to visit him on Sunday because his lungs weren't doing too well and we thought he might die. It took a few days to get approved for surgery. He had surgery on Wednesday, they put a rod in his femur. He came out of surgery just fine and we were all surprised and relieved. But his heart had a hard time recovering (he's had heart failure for years). They had him on three different blood pressure medications that were keeping him alive.

Tim and I went to visit him in the hospital Wednesday night. He was having ICU hallucinations. He was telling us about how he had seen flashbacks to different wars and was very aware of all the carnage and waste that comes from war. At one point he asked my mom if she could "see all the dirt". She told him no and he said, "that's ok, it'll all be gone tomorrow". While Tim and I were there he saw and "angel" at one point that had pink hair, a yellow dress, and black shoes and was 19. He told me I looked like a little girl with my head on a desk, he would ask us to turn the TV off when it wasn't on, and he said "hello" and then said "there's no one there is there?" When I first got to the hospital I asked him how he was doing and at one point he said that he wanted to just fall asleep and not wake up. I asked if he was ready to die and he said yes, he didn't want to be uncomfortable (like my aunts father in law who had recently died from cancer and was very uncomfortable). He said, "I think Sterling was pretty uncomfortable at the end and I don't want that." I asked him that if he did die if he wouldn't mind looking out for us and he said he thought we didn't need it. I told him my kids might and he said he'd see what he could do. Tim asked him what his prime age would be for resurrection and he said 37. Tim asked him about his "wishes" as far as getting off the medications, getting home and comfortable. The plan was to meet with hospice in the morning.

My grandpa passed away at 2:30am the next morning. He had woken up and asked his nurse to turn off the TV that wasn't on. The nurse saw that his blood pressure was starting to fall and contacted Joan and told her to come to the hospital. He passed away before she got there. I think he was ready to go. He went out on his own terms. No one had to make any decisions. He was walking and driving independently up until the fall. He was sharp as a tack and bragged that he got a 30 out of 30 on the Alzheimers test earlier on Wednesday. He had fought a good fight and lived a good life despite having a quintuple bipass surgery at the age of 59 and multiple close calls since then.

In February he had made the decision to be cremated and had made all of the arrangements. Interesting timing right? His ashes are buried next to my grandma Gail's in Mesa. My cousin Jake said a beautiful prayer to dedicate his grave. He was buried on Good Friday with a beautiful funeral that followed. My Uncle gave a small gospel message about how my grandfather was Christ-like, my mom and her two sisters told his life story, Whitney told stories from the grand-children, and my dad gave a gospel message, and my friend Lindsey sang one of his favorite songs, Fill the World With Love. After the funeral all in attendance were invited to stay and chat and have dessert which everyone loved.

Friday night, my grandfathers four kids and their kids and spouses and Joan went to dinner at Jordan's (one of his favorite restaurants that he's been eating at since he was a teenager) to celebrate and share fond memories for grandpa. The entire day was a wonderful celebration.

My grandpa lived a wonderful life. It is a huge blessing to be his grand-daughter. I am going to miss him terribly, but I have faith that I will get to be with him again some day and I am so grateful for that faith and knowledge.

I love you Grandpa!!

He loved tickling the great-grand kids

He spent all the holidays with us and was truly one of the family.

Winter solstice dinner 2017. He bought that black and white tie for the black and white attire.

I was so proud to have made this book for him of the history of the Oak Creek cabin. I was so sad that I didn't finish volume II for him to enjoy.

I remember this day so well. He had something weird happen to his knee and he was staying at my moms house while he was healing. We stopped by to visit and he told my kids the story about how he got his ruby ring. He had killed a tiger with a knife and saved a maharaja and the maharaja gifted him with the ring. My kids loved that story.

This was a Sunday after dinner that he wanted to talk to just the great grand-kids and tell them the story of Joseph Smith and bare his testimony to them.

Meeting Jack for the first time. He really loved holding him.

He would ask every time we were together. If I was feeding Jack he would say, "Is he eating? Can I hold him when he's done?"

We went to go visit him in December. I'm so glad we did!

And I'm so glad I got a picture with him.

Taking a nap with Jack at the Solstice Dinner.

Christmas eve

He really loved Jack and it makes my heart hurt a little knowing that Jack won't remember him. I am so glad I have so many pictures of grandpa holding him. I wonder if grandpa knew he wasn't going to get as much time with Jack as he had with the other grandkids and so he needed to get as much time with him as he could.

I know this looks a little creepy, but this was the Sunday we all went to visit him and his lungs were having a hard time. He was sleeping most of the time we were there. But I'm glad all the kids got to see him.