Somewhere in my past blitherings, I think I mentioned that I didn't have any neighbor kids to play with until I was thirteen. This may give the impression I didn't have any friends until I was thirteen, which is not true. I made a fantastic friend when he moved in next door back when I was eight years old. I knew him as "Grandpa" Jarrell. Curse my fading memory; I can't remember for sure whether that's one "l" or two. I'm pretty sure it was two.

Grandpa Jarrell was 80 when I first met him. There's an almost mystical bond that can form between those of such disparate ages; My brother Dirk had his "Grandpa" Couch back when Dirk was about ten or twelve and Grandpa Couch was around 90. In both cases we would spend literal hours talking to, and more importantly listening to, our respective "Grandpas". Why there is this magical attraction I do not know. I suspect in part there is some awe in a young person's mind, who is just beginning to get out and explore the world a little, from hearing all the stories one accumulates after a long and full life. In turn I think that awe and perhaps even devotion is what endears the senior citizen to the young child.

Grampa Jarrell refered to me as his "little pioneer", and informed everyone I was born 100 years too late. I think perhaps because I was enamoured with exploring and prospecting for gold and such. I think my relationship with him was made even stronger by the fact that both my grandfathers died when I was too young to remember them. Sadly, he died when I was about seventeen. He was the first loved one I lost. Sadder still is the fading away of most the stories he told me during those years I had with him.

What prompted this article was reading Kelsey Page's article: Nursing the Fear of Nursing Homes. If the very old are such a fascination and delight to young children, what happens to them to change this when they become teenagers? You know, I don't think it's senior citizens themselves that scares them; rather, the nursing home setting does. Thinking back to my teenage years, when I had an aunt in a nursing home, I hated going there to visit her. Not that it didn't like visiting with her, as I did, but I hated walking through the home. Unlike the smiling faces Kelsey reports seeing, I saw a warehouse full of sad, lonely people stuffed away waiting to die. They'd look up with just the faintest trace of hope when they heard you, hoping that you were someone coming to see them. Then, when they realized you weren't, they would stare back down at the floor again. Not to mention there was always a certain odor to the place that bespoke of death and dying. Fortunately a nursing home won't likely be my fate - as a reclusive hermit, I'm much more likely to become an isolated shut-in. Which is okay, I have a vast book collection.

Also, I think during your teenage years more than any other period in life is when you really want to hang with people your own age. You're just getting, or have already got your driver's license and wheels to go with it, probably a job or expanded allowance or something to give you a bit of pocket money, you're out from under your parents noses most the time; new freedoms, more lurking in the near future - which is Yours to plan - maybe the last thing you want to spend time facing at that point is your own mortality.

But face it we must. You keep losing loved ones all through your life, until one day it's your turn. Most of us will, or already have, lost both our parents during our lives. I lost my dad 07 Dec 1992 due I'm certain to undiagnosed anxiety disorder, Mom on 08 Sep 1994, from heart failure. I found Dad on the guestroom floor, Mom in her bed. Those images are forever frozen in my mind. Most of us acquire similar images during our lives, never letting us forget we are all mortal, and should not waste the time we have.

Colin and I designed Mom & Dad's headstone; looking at it brings me some feeling of peace. The trout represents Dad's love of fishing, the cat Mom's love of animals, especially cats. The book represents their shared voracious appetite for reading books - which we all inherited. The moral to all this is go out and live your life, and collect your stories - someday you just might be someone's "Grandpa Jarrell".