The Sockdollager (Remembering Grandpa Willett)

 

“Writing, the art of communicating thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the great invention of the world... enabling us to converse with the dead, the absent, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space.”

- Abraham Lincoln 

 

“I’ve lived through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.”

- Mark Twain

It was the 90s somewhere along the Southern California streets. From the backseat of John “Grandpa” Willett’s car, I sat with my sister… waiting. For children under 10, it was the familiar boredom spliced in with the motto “Are we there yet?” Maybe we were going home. Maybe we were going to his house to wait out the afternoon. It doesn’t matter. 

What did matter was the clear and present danger of “The Spider.” This wasn’t an arachnoid crawling across the floorboards or along the window. It was something only Grandpa could possess, appearing at the strangest of times. When boredom had peaked, we’d look to the roof and find his right hand, the fingers crawling from side to side with anticipation. Sometimes I was spared, but every now and then it would drop down and tickle me. As he would pull his hand back up to the wheel, one thing was apparent: we were significantly less bored.

Grandpa was anticipatory. It came in an offhand remark or one of his patented snorts. He delighted in being weird, keeping everyone confused. Even as he slowed down, he had a gift for waiting patiently until the room fell silent. When the reverence faded, he chimed in with a comment that was quietly absurd, doing his best to give life this ridiculous, mythic quality. 

Christmas get-togethers at his house featured a few points where Grandma would hear Grandpa talk about his life. The further into hyperbole that he went, the more subtle he was. In these small, modest ways he painted himself a conquering hero or a lovable trickster. Everyone waited for Grandma to give the punchline “You did not!” Sometimes it was argumentative, but every now and then it was just a misunderstood joke that made the rest of the room laugh. As someone who barely knew him, it was easier to buy into the comedy of his life.

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Certain things were common knowledge about Grandpa. He received the nickname “Mick” in part because of his big ears and his resemblance to a missing child. His father served in World War I underaged and World War II over the median age. At one point he played minor league baseball for The Detroit Tigers, of whom he’d carry a logo-emblazoned key later in life. The story goes that he held the no-hitter record for his school and would still have it if they had chronicled stats back then. He also would later play baseball while touring military bases to entertain the troops. 

His brother, my great uncle Tommy Willett, owned Death Valley Junction where he performed with Marta Beckett at The Armagosa Opera House until his passing in 2005. Among his other defining characteristics was his voracious appetite for literature. He was known for taking baths while reading, which caused more than a few editions to fall prey to a wet demise. 

He was a child of the Great Depression. Every now and then there’d be a story of him biking with Tommy several miles, exploring a less industrial version of California. He claimed to have known when the cities we traveled through were farmlands. He spoke of barren fields and trips up to Big Bear and Sequoia to go fishing with my father. 

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While the Jack London instinct never connected with me, my youth felt defined by summer months being planned around camping trips. Endless hours from the cramped backseat of a truck often pulling a camper were excruciating. The nothingness for miles left nothing desirable to look at and the collected lack of endurance for games meant we still had five hours of awkward silence. My father often laid out plans to pull the boat out and hit the lake after we finished our small boxed cereals. It gave him solace and, from what I could gather, was the cliché thing he bonded with Grandpa over. The excitement of catching a fish mixed with watching him gut it for a dinner was a curious sight, in part because my father dislikes eating fish.

One of the times that Grandpa came along, I remember sitting shoreside for a few hours. The fold-out chairs were out and poles were rustling in the wind. I sat with my book, waiting for the slightest bit of action. Then out of nowhere, a song emerged. It was one of many self-effacing songs created during those arduous hours. I credit my father with its origins, though in actuality it was a play on the Etta James standard “Stormy Weather”:

I don’t know why

We listen to the old guy

There’s no fish here.

In my mind, Grandpa played along, adding his own verse. Lyrical creativity was more of his thing. After all, one of Tommy’s defining traits was having a room full of player pianos and trinkets that played a variety of carousel music and ragtime, notably Scott Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag.” There was an upbeat menace to the whole thing that, even after his funeral, made you smile. It was also there that we got Tommy’s old possessions, including a CD of Jimmie Rodgers’ greatest hits and the revelation (again, I want to say from Grandpa) that we were related to The Yodeling Cowboy. We played it on the ride home nonstop, and the research only continued when we returned.

Let’s go back up to the mountains and my crooning elders. I cannot recall if we ever caught a fish that day, but this epitomized our summers together. The last time my father went with him was many years ago when I was in my 20s. By then I had my own life and didn’t go. Much like his heroes Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain, he had a fascination with the world around him, even providing colorful stories about random strangers he met while camping. I imagine my father will read these ambiguities and fill in the details. 

I remember sitting at Grandpa’s house and having my father slap Grandpa on the shoulder. He wanted him to share a memory. There were whole worlds in those conversations, presenting a time lone gone by. From his quaint little house with religious magazines piled on a coffee table and a cross hanging on the wall near school photos of his grandchildren and an antique clock, he shared something I’d otherwise never discover. There were times when he talked about his father, wishing to collaborate with me on a potential oral history that never came to be. Even when you bothered him while watching golf and complaining about the poor quality of The Press Telegram, he was willing to talk, to ask how you were and see that the outside world hadn’t burned down yet.

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I often visited his house in high school. This was due to convenience, as I was 20 minutes walking distance from campus. Sometimes I saw him in the morning, others early afternoon. I’d crack open a Top Ramen and usually put on a DVD. Whereas it was amusing to see him grow baffled at something like Team America, it was even more amusing when watching Anchorman. He would interrupt and say “You know that’s true, news anchors don’t usually wear pants. I was down there one time and…” It was fun to watch him react because sometimes it was genuine amusement and others I think he worried about my well-being.

He was also supportive of me as a writer. There were times when I’d read something like Doris Kearns Goodwin’s “Team of Rivals” and he lit up, wanting to share his century-old biography of Lincoln to see what I thought. Another time he saw me reading James Baldwin’s “If Beale Street Could Talk” and asked if he could borrow it, saying that he had fond memories of living around Memphis. There was the time he borrowed Stephen King’s “The Gunslinger,” which I think was mostly because of the easily detectable cowboy themes on the surface and not the exponential hybrid of genres. I never got “The Gunslinger” back and he never shared his opinion, but I loved finding those moments where our interests overlapped. 

He kept his mind sharp, able to hold onto his instincts even when other functions were slowly fading away. The most noteworthy was his hearing. It wasn’t always because he was going deaf, but every now and then he’d be at a family dinner and chewing food. For whatever reason, he had incredible luck finding hearing aids that had faulty sensors, causing them to ring with the movement of his jaw. While he eventually got it straightened out, it was tough not to think of his ears ringing every time I saw him since.

Among his funnier observations was his theory on basketball. It started with a story on Bob Cousy and the belief that basketball used to be wimpy until the game moved a little faster and more aggressively. He would then move into his million dollar idea that because so many players had an easy time slam-dunking that they should move the net up a few feet. It was a thing he loved to discuss: controlled chaos. He wanted the world to be seen and act in a different way, if just for his own amusement.

If I had to compare him to anybody, the answer would usually be Grampa Simpson from The Simpsons. While I wouldn’t say he was as agile or capable of getting into as many harebrained schemes, he had this aloofness, this otherworldly way of thinking that caught you off-guard. The common reference point was the famous story Grampa told that didn’t go anywhere (key line: “And I had an onion on my belt, which was the style at the time.”), as if this was somehow evidence of his own narrative skills. My father would mock disinterest just to mess with him. The playful annoyance would become a whole vaudeville sketch by the time we circled back to the onion belt jokes.

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Though if I had to really determine a more fitting character, it would be Woody Grant from Alexander Payne’s Nebraska. I don’t think he ever saw it, but there was something immediate, reminding me of him. It was the offhand remarks, the disconnect from younger generations that sometimes didn’t have his best interests. Still, what struck me upon a recent viewing was that Woody was a character not chasing a million dollar prize because he wanted to die rich, but because he wanted something to leave behind for his family that they’d be proud of. He didn’t have a business, nor did he possess any heirlooms that would benefit his children. Instead, it was a chance to reconnect with what made him unique, to find something at the root of his life story that was worth sharing.

And to me, it resonates because of that. Nebraska was about building experiences, creating memories no matter how offbeat they may have seemed. Even as Grandpa grew older and became more home-bound, he had that spirit about him, that eagerness to know how everyone was. 

He had small ways of giving gifts. When my sister was married, Grandpa was often over talking to my father as he built decorations for the ceremony. Along with the friendly banter, there was something else that made it special. My sister catered to the younger generations with her music tastes, but Grandpa was there selecting older classics from the big band era like The Glenn Miller Orchestra. I wasn’t too involved in the process, but given how well the DJ did, I like to think Grandpa made the wedding a little better with his personalized music cues. 

But I think of the small gifts he gave me personally. It was the hospitality during high school, those car rides, and camping trips. He showed up to my graduations with an appreciation for the hard work I put in. When I grew older and began publishing books, he had copies that he spoke nicely of. He displayed them in his house and sometimes commented on how impressed he was that I could write a whole 300-page book. Even if he never gave constructive criticism, the fact that he saw what this meant to me was the greatest support he could give, especially since he didn’t strike me as the target audience.

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This brings me to one of the more bittersweet and understated moments of our time together. As the pandemic rolled on, he was often forced into a solitary life. Nobody was sure how to handle health protocols, which made certain months early on difficult. Even then, he was in and out of the hospital with various health ailments that come with growing older. The chances of him living a stable, consistent life was difficult. It is why the final moment together didn’t strike me as a profound one but ended up being something that symbolized the greater relationship. 

My father was raking leaves in front of his house. With his walker out, Grandpa called me over. He told me that he was proud of me for publishing novels and recognized the difficulty of being creative. For the first time, he opened up a part of himself that he’d never shared before. He spoke of this story he wrote as a child involving soldier ants building a bridge. He was modestly critical, but did a transparent job reflecting how difficult he personally found creative pursuits. 

The other story was one that caught me even more off-guard. He spoke of his time in school during a more racially polarized era. There was a story of him befriending a Black girl and having that familiar awkwardness around it. It was one of her being the new kid, of not necessarily feeling like she fit in. What followed was a personal recognition of compassion, of him learning to be open and accepting others in his own way. As far as I could tell it wasn’t a life-changing relationship, but one that felt significant to share, of learning to stop and listen to others. After decades together of hearing him joke about everything under the sun, it was striking to find him being sincere.

Following that moment, I said goodbye and went home to do homework. It was then that those final months played out. Soon he would be in the hospital, managing to survive painful conditions until finally dying of COVID-19. 

A final story involving Grandpa happened the day before I received that phone call. My family had packed into the minivan for a game at Cal State Long Beach. My father saw Walter Pyramid from a distance and shared something I’ve heard a few times now. Apparently, Grandpa had a gift for figuring out how to be where he wasn’t supposed to be. When they were designing the top portion, he received a paper that would have names written inside of it. According to my father, Grandpa managed to retrieve the paper and put my name on it. 

Is it true? I cannot be sure.

The sense of discovery with Grandpa remains one I sometimes regret not taking advantage of more. To have learned of his father’s life, or about a California much different from today’s. Even his many impressive careers sounded like they held some allure that should’ve been better documented. He was a modest, confusing man who loved to catch you off-guard, striking up conversation mostly when it suited him. He was from another time and difficult to fully appreciate. He had an eagerness to keep the story alive, to pass it on to generations, to prove that his accomplishments were mighty.

It is profound to consider what his passing ultimately means in the greater Willett story. A small connection to early 20th century history is gone. Those stories of The Great Depression, World War II, and other significant cultural changes only exist in whatever he passed down. His personal experience is no longer able to be pulled from. While there are plenty of great moments I have at my disposal, they hold a certain bittersweet touch now. It was a miracle that he lived as long as he did, but more impressively that his keen sensibility was still intact.

And thanks to Grandpa Willett, those eras are more open to me. For a man who thought he wasn’t a great storyteller, he had this way of bringing the past to life and making you recognize its many wrinkles. He noticed how society changed and appreciated small advancements while loving his youth. There was pride in having a close-knit family that loved him, visiting on holidays, and taking care of him when the outside world seemed unreasonable. My father sacrificed a lot of free time to keep Grandpa safe in the past decade, and credit goes to him for the unenviable task. I’m sure he greatly appreciated it.

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So I think about him, again, from the backseat of that car in the 90s. I still don’t know where we’re going, but The Spider is there. Even when Grandpa had other things on his mind, he had this way of giving you something unexpected, that could make you feel recognized. Sometimes it was confusing, but his heart was in the right place, making you believe that he’d always be there, waiting to drop something meaningful into your life. 

Among the things that resonate most is one of his favorite jokes. Every now and then I’d be speaking of my accomplishments and he’d ask, “Do you know [Claude Debussy’s] ‘Clair de Lune'?” 

Every time he asked, I never had a good answer for him. I was never a pianist nor was I really sure what “Clair de Lune” sounded like. I cannot confirm whether he actually liked that song or if it was just a fun phrase. Still, it stuck with me as one of those weird recurring moments in our time together. I never listened to Debussy before, so there was something even more foreign about it. Grandpa never explained why he did it, and I think it’s one of the few mysteries I appreciate. 

That, and his desire for old timey sayings. He wasn’t eccentric about them, but mostly repurposed old propaganda into puns. In what is probably his most popular example is the old WWII slogan “Buy bonds.” 

Whenever we left his house, he’d come up to shake our hands and reply “buy bonds.” Maybe in more sincere times, he would say “Goodbye,” but it felt like he had his own language that needed to be deconstructed to fully appreciate. Even as an English major, I didn’t have all the tools really to piece it together. It would take research and moments that sparked joy when I finally understood why he was saying what he did. More than anything, he left behind a puzzle of the past, trying to make history feel like something that was alive. In some respects, I’m still trying to solve it and better understand just who he was. The clues are all there. I just need to think a little bit more about them.

Buy Bonds, Grandpa. Thanks for everything. I hope wherever you are that you find someone who knows how to play “Clair De Lune.”