LYC, I was looking at an old newspaper clipping my mom saved from years ago when my granddad was alive . . . cool story IM . . .
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he was a maintenance man at a place in Nashville for many years way back when. According to this paper clipping that Mom saved, when he was 56 (this would have been circa 1964-ish), he was working late one evening when a 20-something yr old man broke in and was trying to break into a drink machine with a tire iron. he tagged my granddad in the head one good time, and that was basically the only shot he got in on my pops.
Granddad wrestled him to the floor, at one point (according to the newspaper clipping) even slamming the guy's head into the floor. he then *sat!!* on the guy, keeping him from escaping while another maintenance guy who'd stumbled upon the scene went to get police, who arrived literally a minute later from just down the street (a cop happened to be on potrol and was literally just a block away when the call went out on the police radio).
when he subdued the guy, my granddad basically was quoted in the paper as having "grabbed the guy by the throat and threw him down" and that this guy was going nowhere -- "one way or another the guy was going to stay" -- until the police got there . . .
now, keep in mind that my granddad was not the biggest man in the world. not exceptionally tall, on the lean side . . . but as my mom put it this evening, he was bull strong from growing up on the farm as a youth . . .
now, here's the part that I love the most . . . remember me saying that he got tagged by a tire iron when the altercation started? well, my pops is quoted in the article as saying -- wait for it! -- "I didn't want to hurt the poor fellow" and that "lucky for him (the intruder), i've had a couple of operations in the last year and i'm not as strong as I used to be."
god I love my grandpa! tough old bugger !! hehehe
I really got a kick out of this and had to share with some folks . . . given a chance, i really do think I'd go back in time and relive some of my youth . . . mostly so that I would have another shot at appreciating what I had a little more and being able to hang out with this guy a little more. in hindsight, i realize that i had and missed a buttload of opportunities to talk to my grandparents and just be around them more than I was. the last few years of his life, my grandparents lived less than a mile away from my family (mostly because he was in declining health by the early 80s when he was in his 70s and my parents wanted them to move closer so that we'd be nearer and be able to help them out more etc etc etc. It would have been nothing for me to walk to their house during the summer or something when I wasn't in school just to hang out and stuff and what not. Knowing this little situation from his past has really given me a smile tonight and a little more appreciation for my family heritage. There are some ugly shadows hiding in the family closet, but this is a happy, bright moment of sunlight that at least gives me moment to smile and know that not all is bad in the world, and sometimes a tough old bugger can hold his own against a much younger man, stand up for himself, and not let someone get the best of him. :)
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