My Grandpa

From: Elise (Candycane3737@yahoo.com)
Story type: Angel
Location: Home
Source: Form Submission

When I was growing up, my grandparents had this wonderful abstract painting that hung at the end of their hallway that was all shades of brown. My grandmother hated it, but my grandfather loved it (which meant that I loved it, too). My grandfather died when I was in 8th grade. It broke my grandmother's heart to even think of taking that picture down because he loved it so much, even when she re-painted the walls and re-did the rugs (even though the painting didn't match anything!)

One day she was sitting there, and the painting fell off the wall. It landed leaning against the wall with the nail still in it, unbent, and the wire along the back of the painting, still intact. My grandmother believed it was him telling her she could take it down now.

I went to visit my grandmother that day and noticed immediately that the painting was gone. When I asked about it, she said I could have it if I wanted it, she was just going to put it in the attic. I took it, excitedly, and hung it on my wall in my bedroom and would lay for hours just looking at it, trying to see something different in it.

When it came time to go to college, I knew I had to take it with me. I wanted to take it off the wall to make sure I didn't forget it, and so a couple days before I left, I set it behind my door for safekeeping. I had opened and closed my door many times in that couple days and it never fell over.

When I made my final run-through to make sure I didn't forget anything the painting still was behind my door (meanwhile I thought I had already packed it in the car. I closed my door for the last time before I got in the car to leave and I heard a loud crash in my room, when I tried to open my door, I couldn't, the painting had fallen so I could just fit my arm in and pick it up. He made sure I didn't forget it. I would have been lost without it.