The Changing World
When I was a young man, maybe 13 years old, I visited my grandfather before he died. He was a salty old man, well he looked old. In truth I don’t think he was much older than 65. Come to think of it that’s only 13 years older than I am now. The thought makes looking in the mirror a whole new experience. How could he have looked so old? I think people of his generation just looked older. Maybe they lived harder lives. Maybe it was the years of cigarettes or gallons of booze. Maybe it was being a Navy veteran in a war this world is starting to forget. Maybe he was just a sick man with paper thin skin wrapped like cray paper over worn and fading tattoos. A man dying of a disease that took him when war and motorcycles never could. Before he died, as a young boy, I sat beside him and he presented me with memories he thought I might appreciate. One was his Navy Blue Jacket Manual, a guide to being a seaman. Another was a large certificate I barely understood. It looked impor