For some reason, a post card written by my paternal grandfather comes to mind. He was a New York City police officer who's job was carpentry. He sent the card to my Grandmother Sarah from an upstate New York Police Camp on July 19, 1923, a Tuesday. The message is all business: he would be home on Friday about 4pm and he was sending his check home with someone named Tim. He never made it. A truck in which he was a passenger ran off a road and he was killed the very next day, leaving the two year old boy who would become my father, and his siblings, fatherless. When Andrew wrote the card I am sure he gave it little thought. Yet the card itself would have arrived after the accident, becoming a message from the grave, his last words, as it were. I'm sure that's why the card survived...how meaningless would it have been otherwise? Forgive my maudlin posting here, but there's a truck for all of us. And this is just a reminder that none of us know when we'll be writing that last postcard. Make it a good one! And Happy New Year too!
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Dec 30, 2007
New Years: what was, and what will be.
Despite the stress, Christmas is a holiday of joy. New Years, at least for me, has always been much more contemplative. In younger years, I threw big parties, perhaps hoping all of the noise and commotion would disguise the passage of time. Now I find myself thinking about where I am and where I might still be. 
For some reason, a post card written by my paternal grandfather comes to mind. He was a New York City police officer who's job was carpentry. He sent the card to my Grandmother Sarah from an upstate New York Police Camp on July 19, 1923, a Tuesday. The message is all business: he would be home on Friday about 4pm and he was sending his check home with someone named Tim. He never made it. A truck in which he was a passenger ran off a road and he was killed the very next day, leaving the two year old boy who would become my father, and his siblings, fatherless. When Andrew wrote the card I am sure he gave it little thought. Yet the card itself would have arrived after the accident, becoming a message from the grave, his last words, as it were. I'm sure that's why the card survived...how meaningless would it have been otherwise? Forgive my maudlin posting here, but there's a truck for all of us. And this is just a reminder that none of us know when we'll be writing that last postcard. Make it a good one! And Happy New Year too!
For some reason, a post card written by my paternal grandfather comes to mind. He was a New York City police officer who's job was carpentry. He sent the card to my Grandmother Sarah from an upstate New York Police Camp on July 19, 1923, a Tuesday. The message is all business: he would be home on Friday about 4pm and he was sending his check home with someone named Tim. He never made it. A truck in which he was a passenger ran off a road and he was killed the very next day, leaving the two year old boy who would become my father, and his siblings, fatherless. When Andrew wrote the card I am sure he gave it little thought. Yet the card itself would have arrived after the accident, becoming a message from the grave, his last words, as it were. I'm sure that's why the card survived...how meaningless would it have been otherwise? Forgive my maudlin posting here, but there's a truck for all of us. And this is just a reminder that none of us know when we'll be writing that last postcard. Make it a good one! And Happy New Year too!
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What is on the other side of this postcard, I wonder? Thanks for posting it.
ReplyDeleteI don't actually have the card, only a copy of the back of it, so I don't know what was on the front. I believe a cousin has the original and I will try to find out!
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