memories will not fade

hearing of your demise does not quite surprises me. you were old, after all, older than time as i knew it. your health was no longer the same - the strenght that i always saw on your thin figure, hardened by a long and tough life, vanished as the years went by. still, the ill news i hear on the phone opens a deep void in a place of my heart that i often ignore.

it's hard to remember you, you know? not because you weren't present; rather because you were so present for so long. in fact, whatever memory i pick from my childhood, you are there, in one way or another. i remember the farm that you used to take care of - where me and your grandson built a small cottage so we could spend our endless afternoons. or in that other farm, of your old friends, by the river - gods, so many adventures in those forests by the water, chasing wild animals and playing so many games... and the meals - my first wine, hardly forgotten. or your house, in that narrow street in the village, with the pictures of your family over the hall's table and the white cat - by the time, the only white cat in the whole village - sitting lazily by the fireplace in those longs winter nights...

you were always there. and, in many ways, you filled a part of the slot that my absent grandmothers have ever left empty. it had been a while since the last time i saw you, but in the end it changes nothing. you will be missed nonetheless.

i never thanked you for everything you meant to me. we never do. wish i could change that.

farewell, old friend. i will see you in heaven.