Personal Narrative: My Father's Hero

My father’s hero has always been his father, my grandfather. Under the influence of my dad and raised in a family where respect is one of the key elements, I’ve grown to love and respect my grandfather just as much. All that changed one night with just one phone call. One night, I happily skipped over to my dad’s room to show him my perfect scores on the math test, knowing that he would be proud of me and then give me a lecture about how I should keep it up and do even better. However, my dad was on the phone. Unwilling to interrupt, I stood at the door and found myself unintentionally eavesdropping on the phone call. It was obviously a call from my aunt. This was nothing unusual, my father liked to keep close in contact with all of his
sisters. Yet,the tone of this conversation was different. In contrast to the usual bright laughter and talking, the call had a deep, dark tone to it and was riddled with silence. After hanging up, my father turned to me. My grades didn’t matter at that point because I thought I overheard something even more important. My grandfather was very sick and senile. Everyone expected his death to come soon, but nobody said it. Nobody wanted to be reminded “Is..grandpa…….um, ok?” I asked hesitantly. “Yes, of course. He definitely is.” That was a complete lie, I could tell. From then on my father shut himself in his room, staying up late into the night. And repeated that, each and every night since that phone call. He woke up early in the morning at around 3 o’clock and walked outside for hours, sometimes not returning until the blistering hot afternoon after everyone had finished lunch. He barely ate, only peanut butter crackers. I hypothesised that he had an emotional connection with all other food, because he had shared them with his own father. The eggs and onions were my grandfather’s favorite, bread is what they ate everyday in china, and definitely no noodles, dumplings or rice. Since he never had peanut butter crackers when he was a child, he had no emotional connection to it. He ate the crackers by the boxful. My mother tried to warn him. His body and health could not keep up like that. A few days later, my mother got a frightening phone call.
My father fainted at his job. I was worried something like that would happen. Even I knew that human bodies could not withstand that much stress. My mother, sisters, and I raced towards the hospital. He did it to himself, and I still couldn’t understand why. He woke up ten minutes later, but the doctor didn’t let him go until late at night.
I Skyped my cousin in China and she confirmed my grandfather’s death for me, because my father refused to believe it. My grandfather suddenly died because of a heart attack. Finally understanding my father’s grief, I decided to help him. I accompanied him on the long walks in the morning and stayed up with him late at night. Often talking to him about subjects that would cheer him up. Bringing him peanut butter crackers and pestering him to eat more and more and more.
Learning to show compassion for others and to experience the sorrow of losing someone changed me from that point on. Realizing that sometimes people don't lie to make themselves appear more desirable or appealing in front of others, but lie in order to mend their own heart. Growing up now, I realized that my father didn’t tell me about my grandpa’s death upfront for two reasons. He didn’t want to believe it himself and he didn’t want to make me sad either. His denial was to protect his own feeling and mine, but I thought it was still better to tell the truth, even if the truth is too hard to
bear.