Life is a gift, that all of us here and many before us have been given. It’s a gift because only through life do you get the opportunity to write your own great story. A story that you get to experience from beginning to end, where you are in charge of every decision, deal with every challenge and eventually look back one day to see the many pages you’ve written. In these pages, you’re guaranteed to find happiness, adventure, friendship and good times right along with sadness, sickness and loss. It’s through this balance of sides that we learn to find our strength, fight for what we believe in, appreciate what we have and learn what it means to be human and mortal. Vincent Kadelski started where we all start, as a child. He has grown to become a friend to many, husband, father, grandfather and great grandfather. He has given love to many and established himself as a large part in the life of many. Although we can’t escape the fact that today we mourn for the loss of his precious life, we must do our best to celebrate this life he lived, his accomplishments, our memories of him, the things he taught each of us and parts of himself the he left behind with us. We must also find relief that suffering is over and his soul is now free to rise and enter the kingdom of heaven where I am sure he will be welcomed and accepted. May he watch down on all of us from above, happy and at peace, knowing that his job has been done, and the mark that he left on this world was a positive one.

For me, he was Grandpa. Of his life, outside of our time together, I only know little from the stories he’s told me. First generation Polish born in America, his parents and siblings still had to make the journey from Eastern Europe. His brother Bruno was the only other family member I remember meeting when we would take our trips together to Cape Cod. As a very young child I still had his mother as my great grandmother. She called me “mister blondie” and “tom e na zad”, Polish for “back and forth” as I endless drove back and forth in my walker. I called here “Kookaboo Grandma”. He served in the US Army Air Corps, did communications during World War II while aboard the B-24 Liberator and B-17 Flying Fortress aircrafts that we heard many stories about. He worked many years for AT&T until retirement. He was married to my grandmother Nina Harold and his children are Mark, Wendy and my mother Sandra. He later remarried to Virginia Ouellette and his family grew even larger as he gained three new children Eddie, Shelley and Lynn. Grandpa outlived both spouses as both Nina and Virginia left this world in 2010.

I have very distant memories of visiting Grandpa in the Weathervane apartments when he still lived in Vernon, but the greatest memories that I have of Grandpa where during the times I would go to stay with him in Cape Cod during the summers. He would pick me up in his red Mazda pickup truck and we would take it on the car ferry to Cape Cod. Grandpa’s house was not a house for kids, but I did my best to play in it and he did his best to keep me entertained. He had the best workshop, in his basement, where he let me use all his tools on scrap pieces of wood. I wouldn’t really create much, but I drilled a million holes in the wood with the drill press, magnetized all his screwdrivers and listened to his Morse code radio. I found that I could also kick marks in his nicely painted basement floor, but he didn’t like that very much. Maybe even less than when I touched his walls all the time with my dirty hands. I would always be outside in the yard exploring where he would show me his ‘Hens and Chicks’ plants, the Bobwhite birds that were always whistling, his bird feeders filled with suet, and we would always drop off leftovers with the crows in a clearing at the back of the yard. When I was left to play on my own, I always climbed the small tree in the backyard that he eventually labeled “Eric’s Tree” and hung a tree making it “Private”. Always after dinner, we would walk together around the neighborhood and meet with the neighbors that were all very fond of him. Grandpa took me to the ocean where he taught me how to dig for clams and where he taught me how to swim. I specifically remember him showing me the back float because he said you would need to know it if you ever got tired and needed to rest. He was also the one who showed me how to play chess and would always show me his little electronic chess set. He taught me how to use the barometer by tapping on it, we played with his special weather radio and we would eat liverwurst sandwiches. My favorite things at his house was the suit of armor lighter, Grandpa’s pipe, his soft leather chair, the scarab and the book of Gnomes. We also had lots of fun visiting the flea market looking for treasures. He showed me the proper way hold a fork and tried to install a bit of etiquette when eating food.

I got older and my trips to Cape Cod stopped. I kept swimming and I taught friends how to play chess. We would still see each other a few times a year and eventually Grandpa moved back to Connecticut. I got married and he always made my wife Holly feel welcome. He was always interested in hearing how things were going with her, with work and with her family. One of the most special moments for her was when Grandpa gave her a mold of my baby foot that my father made and gave him when I born. It was such a thoughtful and emotional act because it was his way of giving her something that he loved to show her that he loved her as my wife. When my sons were born, he was happy to see them and dealt with them running through his house and getting into things. Grandpa always set an example of how to keep a clean well maintained home, how to keep life in order and he always gave his best advice to those he cared about. Even all of the aspects of his passing were accounted for.

I found out on my birthday this year that Grandpa had been diagnosed with cancer and it broke my heart that he had to deal with this struggle after such a long healthy life. Being the type of person that he was, he had a positive attitude, said that he felt well and just told me he was taking his tests and doing what the doctor told him to do. The day after Christmas, I heard that he was in out of his house and being care for. My wife, children and I went to visit him and were able to be with him one last time. Even there, he hadn’t lost his hope and could only think of getting his strength back. He was able to spend his last days living with my aunt and uncle and my mom was also by his side every day. He never had to go through this alone and always had loving family by his side.

So the book of life that Grandpa wrote was rich in experiences and full of so many good memories. Although his last page has been written, we should continue to browse through the leaves of his life and keep him alive in our hearts. Let us celebrate the life of this great man and know that he will always be with us, he is finally at peace and he watches down from heaven on all those he loves. Rest in peace, Grandpa, we love you.