December 10
 
 
 
 

I called my grandparents yesterday and Angelo answered the phone.  "Oh, hi Dane. I'm just sitting here with this nice lady, and we're talking about my old life.  Did you know that I used to work at the Brooklyn Navy Yard??"

I am taken aback--both by him calling my grandmother "This nice lady" and by the question.  I answer:  "Well, yes, I knew that, of course I knew!"

"You KNEW??? How did you know???"

"Well, grampa, I know because I've grown up knowing that.  I know that you were also a diver in the Navy."

"WAS I??  Yes!! I WAS!!!"
 

After that conversation, I knew that something wasn't right.  An hour later, my phone rings and my grandmother says "Here, talk to your grandfather."  I spend the next half hour trying to map out the family to him.  Who I am, who he is, how he is related to me, that 'the lady over here' is his wife.  That he has children, grandchildren. He asks me how I know the lady.  I tell him that she is my grandmother.  He doesn't believe me.  I am unable to resolve the tangle of his mind, I can not bring the pieces of this puzzle together for him, and he is getting angrier and angrier. Finaly, we hang up.
 

He calls back.  "Listen.  I think that you and this lady here are trying to lie to me and tell me some kind of story. Here's what I know."

He tells me the story of my mother's birth.  Some kind of story.  There are people.  There is my grandmother.  He is there.  He asks "So now, tell me.  What do YOU have to do with all of this?!"  I explain it all again.  Again, there is no recognition.  He knows my name, but not who I am.  He knows only that he can not fit himself in.  There is yelling.  More yelling. He accuses me of lying, of tryign to trick him.  The things I am telling him! They are impossible! Married to that lady for 60 years?!  Two children? THREE grandchildren?!!  This house?!! Why am I here?? What is this place?  Who, why?  Why do you do this to me?

Nick and I go to the house.  I have been warned that I might need to be prepared to call an ambulance.  Angelo lets us in.  He knows who I am, but not who I am.  I mean, he recognizes me, but who am I?  We pour over photographs. Again and again, trying to fit people to faces.  Agonizingly it takes another hour or so of our being there for him to snap back, and he does.  I am afraid that this is his future, and all we can do is watch and reassure.

I am leaving out most of the details, I am trying to forget the details.  I will never forget the details.  My grandfather is new and different, and I don't think I know him any better than he knows me.
 
 
 

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