Goodbye Gramp

Today I lost my last grandfather. Franklyn L. Hamilton, 89, of Gloucester MA passed away due to lung cancer. I'm going to miss him a lot.

Growing up, my father's family all basically lived in the same house. It was a two family, with my Great Grandparents living upstairs, and my grandparents living downstairs. While everyone would congregate downstairs to talk, eat, smoke, etc, my Great Grandfather always stayed upstairs. Same chair by the window, always playing video games. For a 10 year old who didn't like smoke, and loved video games, it was great. It was like an escape. I would climb the stairs, knock on the door, and wait for the "Come!" Always the same greeting. Always Gramp.

Always quiet, never noisey or smokey, I would visit with Gramp for hours. He had Super Nintendo before me, Game Cube, N64...etc. And he had a love of the RPG games. Final Fantasy, etc. So he would do all the levels, find all the quests, etc, and help me when I was stuck.

Once I went to college, I stopped playing video games, and didn't visit Gloucester that often. But I would still go upstairs and sit with Gramp. We had less to talk about, but it was still my quiet time with him.

He was an artist, and a lover of books. He had an affinity towards mysteries, especially Sherlock Holmes. He loved the Maltese Falcoln, The Shawdow and other hard boiled detective stories.

Goodbye Gramp. I miss you and love you, and will always think of you the next time I play a video game.