4.25.2010

Something Worth Writing


It's been an awfully long time since I've written, I know. I also realize that I promised I wouldn't take this long between posts, I know. Much of it is due to a lack of motivation, most of it due to the fact that I'd rather play Xbox than have to actually use my brain power to think of something to write. However, now I've got something that's truly worth writing about.

This past Thursday, I helped bury one of the best men that I'll ever know: my granddaddy, Raymond Coppage. His eight grandsons, including me, were his pallbearers. His passing was long anticipated, both in the fact that we knew it was coming since a procedure he had in January, many of us expecting that day to come at any time, and the fact that we knew it was coming since his first heart attack back in the early nineties. Even when I first started dating Meghan back in 2003, we had a pseudo-memorial/recognition event in his honor so that he could see how much he had affected people and how much they loved him, thinking that he wouldn't be with us much longer. Being the stubborn, hard-working man that he is, my granddaddy outlasted every prognosis he was ever given. He lived to be 80 years old, passing away over a month after his last birthday.

I'll start by saying that I never knew granddaddy as well as I should have. Honestly, I don't know much of my extended family as well as I should have. I've always been so much of a self-sufficient person that I haven't made a good, honest effort to get to know those in my life as intimately as I should. Being around all of my family this past week made me regret that. Hearing about granddaddy from letters that he wrote home in college, from stories through his children (my aunts and uncles and mom), and from eulogies by men who called speaking at his funeral their "greatest honor," it was humbling. This was a man that I had 25 years to get to know, and it took his passing to really see how great of a man he was. It made me sad that I'd never get to talk to him again. It made me feel that sense of longing to know my father's father as well. The fact that I was never even able to meet him pains me. I see how much my dad loves him and his memory, and it makes me know that I would have loved him too.

I usually don't cry at these moments. I have a way of compartmentalizing my emotions that I'm sure isn't healthy, but it's effective. It wasn't until we were at the visitation, family only, that I shed my first tears. It was in seeing all of the pictures of granddaddy and grannie together over the years that moved me. There were only a handful of pictures from their younger years since cameras weren't as prevalent back then, but what I saw was a man who loved his wife, who loved his work, and who loved his life. He and my grannie, Velma Coppage, were married when they were 20 years old, and were together for 59 years. As I thought about what must be going through her mind, about what it must be like to have to let go of the man that you had followed, fed, sacrificed for, and loved for nearly 60 years, it broke me. It broke me because I know how much I love my wife, the woman who turns my world, and I know how absolutely devastated I'd be without her now, nevermind 60 years from now. In nearly every single picture that was shown at the viewing and the funeral the next day, grannie and granddaddy were together, smiling, hugging, loving each other every step of the way.

I listened at the funeral as the pastor at granddaddy's last church spoke. I listened as my Uncle Ray talked about his dad in a way that I had never heard him speak, seeing emotion in him for one of the first times I can remember. I listened as a man I had never even heard of before spoke about how granddaddy helped found a seminary in India by fronting the first portion of funds, and how that seminary is now graduating 15+ young ministers a year. That same man, I'd guess about 80 years old himself, said that my granddaddy was one of his dearest friends, and the best man that he'd ever know. He said, "I've received alot of honors in my time... but this, speaking here about Raymond, this is the greatest honor I have ever had." I listened as my mom spoke about her daddy, thinking how amazingly strong she was throughout the whole thing, telling stories that he would have wanted to tell, that he did tell probably a hundred times to his kids and grandchildren and great grandchildren. I stood with the rest of our family as we sang "The Old Rugged Cross" and every one of us struggled to hold back tears as we thought of granddaddy looking on from heaven, finally receiving the reward for his eight decades of faithful service to Jesus.

Granddaddy was a gardener, a farmer, a fisherman, and a pastor in every sense of the word. I heard more about him this past week than I had for most of the rest of my life. All of it just reminded me of what I already knew: he was one of the best men that I'll ever know. While I know that Jesus' sacrifice should be enough reminder daily that we should live to the standard that he's set, Granddaddy's passing has put that back in focus for me. His example, his life has reminded me that living righteously is possible. Knowing that he's up in heaven, looking down on us, makes me want to be a better man. Seeing the hundreds of people at his funeral made me want to make that kind of impact with my life. Witnessing the passion and outpouring of emotion for his life inspires me every day to simply be better. I know that Granddaddy has more important things to do with Jesus than to look in on me, but it's that thought that has me already thinking clearer.

I love you, Granddaddy. Thank you for everything... and tell Jesus I said "hi."