Spikes Grandad

Apart from my immediate family, the rest of the family I don't consider myself to bond with all that well. I get on with them, and I still love them, but I am very different to them and as a child was so shy that I'd barely speak to any of them. There was one exception though, and that was my Grandad on Dads side. He died about eight years ago now, but it really doesn't seem that long.
He'd had a stroke and was taken to hospital. That was the last time I saw him. He hated it there, and one night he had gotten up to try to escape, but he fell over and hit his head. A nurse attended him by putting a plaster on his head, but didn't report it in an incident book, and didn't check for concussion. That night he died. After the postmortem it was revealed that it's very likely concussion was the cause of death.

Quite a few people attended the funeral which was at his local church, but it was only Dad and myself who went with the coffin to the crematorium. It was a very strange feeling there. I didn't cry at the church or crematorium, as I find it very hard to cry.
I certainly felt a stronger bond between Dad and myself, and I did like the fact that it was just us two who saw him off properly. I know Dad was very upset, and it was a strange feeling knowing that after all the years, it was now me who was there for him.

I have to admit, I was still often very shy around Grandad, but I did look up to him a lot. Mainly because he was totally bonkers. He would sit in a corner smoking a pipe and not really say much, but when he did talk, he'd pretend to be stupid for laughs, which always worked.
He had some odd ways, and in later life the main thing he'd eat would be Jam sandwiches while he sat and watched 'Home and Away'.
Although he's dead, and I don't believe in an afterlife, I like to think that he still lives on through me in a way. I guess I am now the nutty one in the family, and now that my confidence has grown, they all seem to be aware of that. He was always one for the ladies as well as being silly. I think I've certainly taken on some of his traits though, which although others may not, I consider to be a good thing.
I do miss Grandad, and I do wish I'd spoken to him more and gotten to know him better. It was very rare I saw a serious side to him, although I know there must have been. I know he was at the battle of Dunkirk, and then went off to Burma to fight against the Japanese. He never spoke about it though.
I hope he knew that he was someone I looked up to. I never really showed that I did though, but I know Grandma now knows that I did, which I guess is a good thing.