I guess it's normal to feel a certain amount of anger or pity when someone like Grandpa is taken from us. But, somehow, in Grandpa's very special case, those kinds of emotions seem a bit out of place...even greedy. We had him for so long. In fact, we don't know exactly how long. We do know that Grandpa had much, much more than his allotted threescore and ten - -that, give or take a couple of years, he lived for a century. How much more could we have asked for?

Indeed, it would be hard to ask more from life than Grandpa received. And I don't mean only the uncounted years. Much more even than time, he had the immeasurable love of his wife and family, as well as the incalculable satisfaction of accomplishing exactly what he set out eighty years ago to do -- which is really nothing short of realizing the American Dream.

That's a sorely overused phrase, I know, but I think you'll agree that it fits Grandpa's story perfectly. He was the self made man imagined by Emerson and Whitman and Horatio Alger. Starting out with little more than an idea of the future he wanted, he struck out on his own, and by dint of his own effort, realized the dream, for himself and for his family. He became a patriarch, living to see three generations of his offspring set out from Long Island, their own ways made easier by his generosity. At the end of his life, he had success, years, and the love of a large family in rare abundance.

This all sounds like something dreamed up in Hollywood. But the fact is, Grandpa was like that -- he was in many ways larger than life. Everything about him seemed exaggerated -- his devotion to family, his pleasure in making deals, his enthusiasm for a fresh tomato or a filet mignon, and, of course, his boundless passion for land. Buying and selling it, yes, but also walking it by the mile, and working it by the shovelful. Grandpa was one of those rare men who seem blessed with more than the normal measure of the life force. Had they met him, I have no doubt that Balzac or Dickens would have put Grandpa in one of their novels. To the end, he was someone to be reckoned with, a man who cast a big shadow. Even into his nineties, he remained a powerful force in the daily lives of at least a dozen here today.

It is only natural that a man like that would drive you a little crazy once in a while. Over the course of his long life, Grandpa developed some pretty definite ideas about how to live, and he was not a man to keep his own counsel. A few weeks ago, my cousin Jan and I were talking about Grandpa. Jan's love for Grandpa runs deep, yet he confided to me that sometimes he found Grandpa a little hard to talk to. Grandpa was always giving him a hard time about something or other. Why hadn't he gotten married yet? What kind of car was he driving? Why didn't he buy an apartment, instead of throwing money away on rent? Well, it seems that Jan thought he was the only one of us grandchildren who caught this sort of harassment, and he was mightily relieved to hear a catalog of items Grandpa bugged me about year after year -- there was the beard I used to wear, and the fact that my car was never washed, and my interminable courtship with Judith. I know Justin and Steve have their own little lists. I sometimes think these issues and pet peeves were a memory device for Grandpa -- his way of keeping two dozen grand- and great-grandchildren straight in his head. But more likely, to a man whose vocabulary was narrower than his affections, these were his words of love.

I don't mean to suggest by this that Grandpa was intolerant or reactionary, because he was neither. For a man who spent a good part of his childhood in the nineteenth century, Grandpa was remarkably open and flexible. He came to accept and support the careers of the women in the family, as well as the diverse lifestyles of the grandchildren, some of which must have struck him at times as bizarre. Grandpa was learning and growing to the end.

What can I say about Grandpa's generosity? It was as prodigious as everything else about him. He gave us all in countless ways. For many of us, he made risky careers possible. And then there was all that stuff he'd cram your car with after visits to Long Island -- the tsochskes, mementos, and figurines, the cans of pina colada mix and Turtle Wax picked up on special at Waldbaums, and, in my case, neckties as wide as Mississippi. Though Grandpa was several sizes smaller than I am, he insisted that I looked very sharp in his suits and sport jackets. I used to beg off, but after a while I started to cart the clothes home with me. I had learned to interpret all those double and triple knits as just one more of Grandpa's distinctive terms of endearment. Today I have a closet full of them.

It is especially difficult to come to terms with the fresh absence of a man whose presence has loomed so large for so long. Very few of us here have ever known a world without Grandpa, and they probably can't remember what such a world was like. Certainly it will be hard getting used to. Especially for Grandma, who can't be with us today. If there is one thing Grandpa would want us to keep in our minds in the days ahead, that would be Grandma's welfare. I know he would want us to honor his memory by caring for her.

There's one other thing I'm sure of. I have no doubt -- it goes completely without saying -- that Grandpa will live strongly in our memories, and in the imaginations of our children. We'll be telling stories about Grandpa, and hearing his voice, for countless years to come.

Michael Pollan

April 23, 1987