Grandkids

 Hayter’s article for January 9, 2022

“All right already with the Grandkids!”

 The bug is Jill's grandson    

Have you noticed how relationships often change over the years? Perfectly natural. I’ve mentioned before how I never imagined losing the friends I had in my childhood. I assumed we’d live on the same block forever. That was because I was dumb as a kid. But I was fairly smart while in high school and college. It was during my years of higher learning that I realized that the ties of family and friends last forever. 

In my earlier articles, I wrote a lot about family and friends, because we did so much together. Now? Not so much. Back then, the Hayter brothers went on hikes and campouts. We played softball and golf together. We haven’t had any overnight excursions in years. What killed ‘em was CPAP machines. Three of the Hayter brothers use ‘em and the fourth needs to. Our softball days are over as are our golf outings. I quit softball as soon as I started embarrassing myself. I quit golf after giving my clubs away. Jill and I used   to talk on the phone a lot and take walks. Not so much anymore. 

            The Plilers and Hayters used to go all over the place together. For each birthday, we’d give the birthday person $15 and let them spend it on whatever they wanted… as long as it wasn’t something they needed.  Of course, we never went from Tucson to Tucumcari, but we did do some traveling.

            I’ve managed to trace the lack of contact between The Plilers and Hayters back to the time they sold their camping trailer. They just sold it right out from under us. Now we pretty much only talk on the phone, and then, generally when we need a favor. But, truth be told, none of the excuses I’ve offered up are directly linked to the distancing of family and friends. The real reason can be found in the next paragraph.

            Ah, there you are. The one thing that weakened our relationships was GRANDKIDs! I don’t know what happens to two perfectly sane people when their children start having children. Relatively sane adults turn into creatures that are not all that fun to behold. I can work around someone’s sons and daughters, but their grandkids? My eyes cannot fathom what it is they see in those kiddos. Behavior that I see being spoiled, rude, and selfish, grandparents see as lovingly cute.  

            And photographs? You would not believe! I’ve been forced to block most of my family and friends from Facebook. Jill has been sending out a photo of her grandkids every day for two weeks. When she announces the last photo, everyone is supposed to vote for their favorite photo. Be still my heart! -- “Love me—love my grandkids” is not an obligation I care to accept. 

            Before you wish a pox on me, let me confess that Kay and I never had kids because she thought it best to wait until I acted mature enough to be a father. I didn’t reach maturity until the age of 63. So I don’t know what it’s like to have kids or grandkids. I know Kay would’ve made a great mother and grandmother, but we both realize that it was wise to wait. So, our life has been void of us having the experience of sons, daughters, and grandkids. I can live with that. The one thing I find hard to live with is the problems associated with organizing family gatherings. They take two weeks to prepare and two weeks to get things back to normal. Now the family can go two years without an outing. So, no family. No Plilers. Do you know what that leaves me with?  – See next paragraph.

            Brad Meyer! Brad and I have little in common. Brad likes ham salad. I can’t stand it. He doesn’t care for sauce on his pizza! We can’t talk politics without raising our voices. We both play racquetball and Brad usually beats me. In his lifetime, he’s had more jobs than is normal, and has traveled all over the place. Brad has a million stories and I enjoy listening to him talk. If I say more than three sentences, he pretends to be taking a nap. Brad likes “Gilligan’s Island” and “The Beverly Hillbillies”, and he enjoys movies with sad endings. 

            All of these facts can lead us to only one conclusion. Brad and I have no business associating with one another. And, we wouldn’t be had he not asked me years ago to join him for his restaurant reviews. We’d go all over the county on the newspaper's dime and try out different restaurants. Brad would write about the experiences and then we’d team up and tape our review. We even did a radio broadcast together for a while. During our public projects, Brad tossed a lot of insults at me. He was playing Jackie Gleason to my Art Carney.

            Today, we’re more like Seinfeld and George Costanza. Brad thinks he’s Seinfeld. The important thing is, that, though he has grandkids Brad doesn’t make a big deal about it. And, that’s important, because the minute he starts sending me pictures of his grandkids, I’m gonna start winning some racquetball matches. And if he ever asks me over to watch some reruns of “Bewitched” or “Green Acres”, I’m dropping him like mustard on grapes.     

 

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