From the very beginning, I can remember, my granddad William and my grandpa Bennie, sitting me on there knees and telling me all there amazing stories about the adventures there life had given them together. I can remember sitting in there study, on the old leather chair that used to be my grate granddads and as I kicked my legs against the desk, I would move from side to side. There was so much to gaze at while I sat there, so many shelves full of thing's and each and every one had its own story to tell. Every time I visited, I would pick something up, get comfortable and wait for the story about it to be told.
One day I had found a small gun in one of the draws in the desk, I thought it was a real one, so I asked them about it. They told me to take it out and come light there cigars for them with it. I was very worried they had lost the plot and I told them, that I might shoot them in the face, but after I had insisted I was to test it out into the bin first, thinking It would be shooting out a bullet and making a very big banging noise, I realized it was just a lighter.
My grandpa had brought it for my granddad, on there first year anniversary, it was one of those novelty things, that you could get engraved. I looked at it very closely as they told me the story, noticing the scratches all over the silver from it being in pockets with coins in and there on one side of the barrel, was the little letters engraved. The letters made words that read, 'We'll Shoot Them Down Together', as I read it out loud, they both giggled, while they remembered the day it saved them from a mugger.
I would fling myself from the swinging chair and plopped my little body down into the gap between them both on the sofa. Facing the little gas fire, that looked like a real coal one, they started to reminisce and tell me 'the story of the little gun of fire'. I always loved the way they would add titles to there adventures, like they were reading me a book and they were very good at telling a story, I could have gone around finding objects and books all day and everyday, just so they could tell me the story behind why they kept it.
There was a little green, leather bound book, that was grandpa's. It was a book about different types of plants and flowers, he would take it most places with him and when he saw a plant or flower, he would mark it off in the book and study it. Some of the plants and flowers he would do scientific experiments on, and he would even make perfumes. He would keep it in the breast pocket of his jacket, most days and he was very lucky he did, as in 'the story of the little book of life', I learnt if my grandpa had not, he might have been stabbed in the heart.
There are many stories, that my wonderful grandparents told me, while I grew up and became a man. From the moment I learnt how to read and write, I had started to put down, on paper, all of the stories they had told me, about everything in that little room, they called there's and just before they both passed away, one year ago, they decided to show me something, a secret place they had. It was hidden in amongst all the stuff, it looked just like a wallpapered part of the wall, behind some of the books. As I had watched my granddad, push at it and I heard a small 'click', I noticed the wall turn into a door, just like magic.
Behind the magic door, lay a little room, only big enough for a few, what looked like scrap books and a hand made, wooded box, which was full to the brim with more objects, that I new there would have more stories to go with them. They were showing me there whole life, there life together, that they had written down. There were diary after diary, scrap books full so fat they were closed with string and as we all sat together, reading and looking. I realized how much I would miss them both, how much they really meant to me. At this time they were both dyeing, they new they did not have long left and told me I could do anything I wished with there life and I was to remember to live life to the fullest, to never let a day go by, without it being exciting, full of love and happiness.
So here I am, doing as I will with my wonderful grandparents lives. I am hoping the rest of the world will enjoy, what I have, for many many years, and in reading this, you all might just realize something inside yourselves, that will change your life forever!
Copyrights © S.E.Seddon 2010/2011
Copyrights © S.E.Seddon 2010/2011
