It was the day of my grandpa’s funeral.

I gazed out of the car window as I thought about him. “Alrighty we should be there in about an hour,” my mom said. Great, I had only an hour to write a speech about him. I had to write a speech about my grandfather for his funeral. I had so many things to say about my grandpa but I couldn’t get it all down to paper; the fact that I was six and barley learning to read and write only made it harder so my dad helped me. When I was done I didn’t think much of it. When we arrived, all my family was there, and not one of them wasn’t hysterically crying… Except for me. For some reason I didn’t feel like crying, I missed him more than most of the people there that’s for sure but I wasn’t going to cry. I looked down at him, “goodbye.” I said. I looked at him hard hoping he was going to open his eyes and we would go home. That didn’t happen. A tear rolled down my cheek just like on did the day that my grandma and mom told me the bad news; only this time I was in a suit looking down at him, last time I was in my clothes watching “Hey Arnold” with my Halloween candy. And that was the last time I ever saw my best friend.

I felt a tap on my shoulder I looked over, “are you ready,” my dad whispered to me with sympathy. I nodded my head slowly. I walked up onto the stand; I looked over to my left, my mom and grandma smiled at me. I started mumbling my speech; I couldn’t read my own writing which was extremely bothersome so my dad helped me pronounce the words. Everyone smiled at me thinking I was so cute; but I didn’t want to be cute right now, I wanted everyone to know how I felt about him, I didn’t want to let him down, especially not at his funeral. I sat back down and my Mom pat me on the head while I leaned on her shoulder. My Dad stayed up there and started his speech. “The man loved fruit,” he preached. He made people laugh, shake their heads, and he made people cry. But not in a bad way, they wanted to cry! And it was happy tears? They weren’t crying because they were sad; they were happy. I think that it was because they were remembering how great of a person he was.

When the funeral was over we all went outside and stood on the sidewalk. “You did a good job, he would have been proud,” my cousin told me. “Thanks,” I replied. I couldn’t have disagreed more. I walked over to the side of the funeral home and sat with my back on the brick wall, my arms wrapped around my legs, my head in my knees. “What’s the matter,” my Dad asked. “I know you miss him but...” my Dad said before I was able to answer him. “No, it’s not that, it’s just I really wanted a great speech like yours…” “You didn’t want to let him down,” my Dad interrupted again. “Yeah,” I replied. “Greg,” he started. “Do you think that for one minute anyone would think that you didn’t love him?” “No,” I answered back with my head still down. “So why does it matter?” “You got out what you had to say and it was great, so what if you had a little trouble with reading the words,” “Your right,” I said. “C’mon lets go home,” he said. I smiled, “alright.”