Life and Family

This last weekend, a member of my family died. I was never all that close to him, despite how closely related we are (grandparent-grandchild). Part of it was moving from place to place as I was growing up and, once I was a teenager, my unwillingness to get close to him (amongst other members of my family but for different reasons). The sad part is, he was the only grandfather I ever really knew (reasons why on that will not be mentioned here). Since I lived in a state clear across the country from him and even though I only saw him every couple of years, I could see how he was deteriorating into what he was before he died. By the time I was 18, I knew he wasn't going to live long enough to see me through my 20's. I just didn't think that he would die this soon into my 20's. From what I heard, things were looking fairly bad for him and now that he's gone, I'm glad his suffering in this life is over.

In a way, his dieing makes me more grateful for the LDS church. There's comfort in knowing that he's just on the other side of the veil and that he'll be given a second chance on the other side of the veil and that I can give him that second chance by proxy baptism in the temple and any other ordinance that I can do for him. In this way, hopefully I can get to know him better in the only way I can before I cross the veil myself. I already have a small list of people's names that I want to take to the temple in hopes of being able to do their work for them and my grandfather's name has been now added to this list.