The top is down and the breeze is alive. The radio is jingling Little Richard and Joe and his best friend Bobby are barreling down the Golden State Freeway on a boiling summer day in July. They have just arrived in Los Angeles to visit Anne, their daughter and daughter-in-law respectively as well as little Rose, their Granddaughter whom Bobby has never met. The visit is a very long time in coming for Bobby.

His reluctance sadly kept him away from his only granddaughter for the first two years of her life. He simply could not bring himself to come. It was just over two years ago his only son Jack was killed in action in Korea having never met his infant daughter. The tragedy of this was multi-faceted.  Leaving Anne alone, a young mother in a state far away from her family, a little girl fatherless, and to boot before Jack had left for his tour he had had words with his father. It had not ended well and now it will be forever etched in his father’s mind with regret and pain.

Bobby had not wanted his son to join up. He felt his responsibility was to his pregnant wife. There are others to serve. The last war, the war of all wars, had left so many souls bereft. The Korean War was simply a precursor to yet another power struggle for men in top places of the government using young men and boys as pawns.

Bobby was never as pro-military as his friend Joe had been. Back in their home in Ireland Joe had fought to serve with the Irish Republican Army but his youth and his father had kept him out. Then later it was his vision and hearing which were well below acceptable for action.

And now Jack was gone. His father still tasted the last angry words of defiance on his tongue. He had spent the last two years throwing himself into his work at the paper and drinking away his loss.

His wife, Lizzie, had visited Anne a few times after the baby was born and directed her own pain into making sure Anne and her granddaughter were cared for and well. She was angry at Bobby for avoiding but did not push. The loss of a child is never explained away. Never put to rest. Never better. Only bearable.

And now finally he was here. It had been Joe who had gotten him to come. They had taken some long walks down by the pier reminiscing about their younger years back in Ireland. It seemed like a different world. A different person. Joe mentioned that the baby Rose had his large blue eyes. The same blue eyes Jack had. The same blue eyes Bobby’s mother back in Kildare had.

“Bobby, you know the old saying, ‘The Irish ignore anything they can’t drink or punch’.” Joe clapped him on the shoulder and kept his hand there. And Bobby made plans to go to California.

The small house in Echo Park is festive and clean. The rooms are colorful and the windows are propped open, the wind moving the curtains to and fro.

Anne hugs her father and Bobby fiercely. Her long dark hair is pinned back and there is iced lemon tea on the small circular Formica table.

Little Rose has toddled over and is quickly winning over her grandfather. Her large blue eyes are the color of a sky before the storm and her smile is the sweetest thing Bobby has ever beheld.

Bobby and Joe stay in the spare room for a week with Anne before heading back to New York. It is a happy week. Warm and full of laughter. A laughter that was missing from Bobby ‘s eyes and heart for two years.  Before they left Bobby presented Anne with a beautiful acoustic guitar.

“For Rose. She seems like a musical child if ever there was one.”

Bobby and Joe kiss Anne and Rose and then they are off. It was only a few years later that Bobby passed away in his sleep, a picture of seven-year old Rose by his bedside.  

Next Chapter: Rose, Los Angeles, January 1976