Happiness happens when we learn to expect nothing but appreciate everything

This is my Grandmother and Grandfather
on their wedding day.

Last week was a week of excitement and sadness all mixed together.  On Thursday I had to skip two classes and work to go home for my grandfather's burial.  He had passed away on January 18th, 2012 and considering it was January and the ground was completely frozen we were unable to bury him after the funeral.  I was speaking to my boss about me having to miss work because of this and after a while of talking she said she had never thought about that, considering everyone she has lost in her life has been in the spring fall or summer, and they were always able to bury them after the funeral.  She expressed her condolences for my loss and mentioned how hard it must be to have to deal with the loss on two separate occasions.  Yes, she is correct it is difficult to have to deal with it once in January and then again a few months after, and I was anxious about it to say the least.

At the burial, when I thought it would be extremely painful and sad, I was surprised as to how much easier it was to deal with the loss.  It is amazing how much four months can do in the healing process.  In January whenever anyone said Beepa (which is what everyone in my family called my grandfather) or mentioned a memory with him, someone in my family would start crying.  As I have mentioned before I have a rather large, close family, so it doesn't take much to get everyone crying when someone else is.  Along with crying though, there is laughter, when one person starts laughing, everyone starts laughing, and that is how the burial was surprisingly easy.  It isn't hard to think of the times with Beepa that are hilarious and that is what my family focused on during the burial ceremony.  The actual ceremony was solemn and touching, but when the minister asked my family to sing a verse of amazing grace, we all couldn't help but chuckle.  My family is not musical to say the least and my grandfather always found it amusing when we tried to be musical, so singing at the burial ceremony was a perfect way to lighten the mood.

After the formal ceremony, we all went to my grandmother's house to have food and celebrate my grandfathers life and be together as a family.  At my grandmother's house my cousin who is 26 announced that his girlfriend, Katie, would be having a baby boy.  We have known she is pregnant for a while but they were keeping the sex of the baby secret.  They decided though that when they decided on the name Nolin, that the get together after my grandfather's burial would be a perfect time to announce the sex.  My grandfathers name was Olin Kenneth Johnson Junior, and naming the newest baby to enter our family after him is, in my opinion, one of the best ways to honor him.  So after a ceremony that turned into a celebration, and an announcement that honors my grandfather, I would say the day that I thought could be really sad, turned into a day that was full of laughter and tears of happiness.  I can never express how much I miss my grandfather, but I have learned over the past few months, that my Beepa who was always laughing and always cracking horribly bad jokes, would not want us crying over him, he wants us to appreciate the life we have now and be happy the way he always has.