It was the notoriously warm summer of 2012, mid August, and 14 hours of sun per day, but I felt as if I was in a blizzard. A blizzard of negative emotions, that is. My 70 year old grandfather, the person who I trusted the most with my personal secrets, even more so than my parents, who was the most genuine, caring person I had ever known, was dying, sprawled out on a plain bed in the University of Michigan’s hospital, with little to entertain him. My grandmother and parents were noticeably trying their hardest to hold back tears, and even my normally stoic face was turned away to hide my sorrow, I did not want to lose a family member at my young age of 14, because although I would never admit it, I was simply not mature enough as a pubescent teenager to have a loved one die. If I couldn’t handle the idea of my grades falling below A-, how was I going to handle something as heavy as this? But despite our negativity permeating throughout his bedroom, he was still his old, happy self who was comforting to everyone around him, he wouldn’t stop laughing, and never changed his tone of voice from positive. “I’m alright, they’ll probably find a donor heart.” It was right then and now that I began to realize that Grandpa’s happy go lucky attitude was positively affecting him, and that he may already have died if not for his willingness to fight this disease. All my life, I had repeatedly heard that “Perseverance is Key”, but I had believed that it was merely another mindless chant of  “Never give up”, meant to inspire little kids. But after I had seen my Grandpa, someone who I had always admired, fight for his life, and hold out even when he was fighting a losing battle, I realized that the mindless chant I had dismissed in annoyance earlier, is absolutely true.

But, there was still doubt on whether a heart transplant would work. My mother told me “If he dies, we’ll eventually see him in heaven”, and I believed her, but it didn’t change the fact that my grandfather was dying of an agonizingly painful heart disease which frustratingly had not flared up since he contracted it in 1951 at the age of 9, but suddenly decided to return with a vengeance, 61 years later. He was 20 pounds underweight, and incapable of walking three steps without collapsing in exhaustion, just like when he had first contracted it. When I was told what happened to him, I was convinced that the Universe was teaching me a life lesson. Was it telling me that sometimes bad things happen to good people? Was it telling me that I couldn’t stop bad things from happening? I knew that I couldn’t change the fact that some people die earlier than the average U.S. life expectancy of 77, and I tried to convince myself that I was prepared for the worst. But try as I could, I was incapable of convincing myself that I was ready, because in my mind, the idea of my Grandpa dying was going to be different from the times when I had seen some other relatives die. My Great Grandfather had passed in 2004 at the age of 90, and my Great Grandmother in 2006 at the age of 89. I had been happy at the funerals of my Great Grandparents because they had lived long, fulfilled lives. I didn’t mourn, or cry a single tear, because I knew that they were in a better place, even at the age of 6, or 8. The thing was, Grandpa was about to die in 2013 at the age of 71, and break the tradition of my family members living past the average life expectancy. I thought that it wasn’t justified that the person who was quite frankly, my best friend in the whole world, even more trusting to me than my own mother and father, and more significant to my life than my Great Grandparents, was going to die too early. Because of this, losing Grandpa was going to hurt much more than losing my Great Grandparents, and my 6 and/or 8 year old self was about to have handled the death of a loved one with less crying, grunting, and mourning than my 14 year old self. I could only imagine a tombstone that read “David Moore 1942-2013, Loving father, grandfather, and friend.”

Suddenly, while sitting in the bland, motionless waiting room, my mother’s voice announced that a donor heart was discovered, and that my grandpa had a great chance of surviving. I was still recovering from my miserable state, but I was overjoyed at the prospect of Grandpa living for another stretch of life before ascending to heaven. But there was still a shadow of doubt which was cast over the idea of a heart transplant. There was still a slim chance that the doctors would fail, and Grandpa would die during the procedure. I was anxiously waiting for weeks before the report, but finally, I learned that the procedure was successful. Grandpa would live, but would have to be tested for his body rejecting the organ, and would have to take daily pills for the rest of his life, and wear a mask over his face to keep out germs while in large crowds. Fast forward a few more months, and Grandpa was “doing better than most 50 year olds would”, according to the medical report. His body showed absolutely no signs of rejection, and his physical therapy was working. Grandpa was up to a healthy weight, not overweight like how he was before his disease flared up. He would be able to go off of several of his pills, and take off his mask in small crowds. But most amazingly, my Grandfather, David Moore,  was the oldest person to ever have a heart transplant at the University of Michigan, at 70 years old, he managed to defeat a disease, get back into shape, and go from collapsing from walking, to working out in the hospital every day with light exercises.

Upon further examination, I realized that the old phrase “Every cloud has a silver lining” applied to my situation. Because of his heart disease, he had to be tutored in his 4th grade year, and that is how he learned how to read. He was incapable of reading before he was tutored by a personal teacher who was more friendly to him than normal teachers. Since he was stuck in a small bedroom before the age of the internet, video games, mobile phones, his only entertainment was a large collection of books, which he practiced reading on every single day. The heart disease, though causing him a world of pain, saved Grandpa from the Vietnam draft after graduating from college in 1964. He would likely have either been traumatized, never met my grandmother, or worse, killed. Finally, even though he was in terrible pain during his disease, Grandpa was never a defeatist, and never gave up and submitted to death. Although my grandmother was incredibly miserable, and my Mom, his daughter, was terrified of losing him, Grandpa would never give up, and still managed to keep a positive, joking atmosphere in his hospital room. I felt as if God had sent down this disease so that Grandpa’s life would be saved, and that my family could have existed, then sent him a new heart when the disease was no longer necessary. I no longer take my family for granted. I know that I could lose them at any moment, and I never act as if they will stay here permanently anymore. But Grandpa’s attitude, life story, and recovery inspired me to be a positive person, and taught me that never giving up, finding a solution, and hoping for the best is the best course of action when hard times hit.

As a result of knowing that his perseverance saved his life, I have never allowed myself to give up on anything anymore. I’ve vowed to myself to fight to the death against whatever disease I may contract in my old age, and to never stop until I’ve reached my childhood dreams of spreading renewable energy, ensuring that the world’s economy is forever healthy, even colonizing Mars and terraform it to be livable, or bankrupt myself by trying. While it is true that eventually, everyone runs out of time, I’m going to be much more prepared for the worst. Ever since I was told that “We’ll eventually see him in heaven”, I’ve been able to imagine him being put into a casket in the ground without tearing up. Maybe because of that, I’ve become a more mature person, and my nearly dead Grandpa will leave me a little bit more prepared for the future emotional challenges that the world will inevitably throw at me.