24th May 2012
Dear Cassi,
It is a truly odd note that I should rack
my brain over Grandpa Leland, but the door twixt he and I has long shut. Those
who would recall these stories for me are as dead to me as he is because of the
pain they have caused.
Who was my paternal grandfather? He was a
grower with his hands in the earth, a tinkerer in things mechanical, and a
carnal earth spirit. I know these things from the stories of him and how they
called him a monster. There are some folks, Cassi, who are terrible because
they exist. Those like Alan and Ann are folks of this thread as they demand my
suffering for their own pried.
There are folks in this world who are
wonderful because they exist but still are just normal people. These are the
people I work with who spend their lives in the service of the less fortunate.
From the work done in my building the hungry are given food, the cold given
blankets, and the street people can become honest working folks.
Grandpa Leland was described to me as a man
who chose to be horrible. However, this is by folks who thought poorly of my
mother, and my mother’s greatest crime was to live hard to make use of what
short a life she was given.
As she got on well with her father-in-law I
must think that his tenacity was a hunger for life. A bit of grandpa never
stopped being young and adventurous, and maybe he came off poorly because he
was misunderstood. He lived in the moment because he knew no other way to live.
Would life be so bad if we all did the same?
Live your moments, little sister,
Richard Leland Neal
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