I am a German

My great-uncle (grandma's brother) passed away on Sunday. Before you express your condolences let me say that I had only met him once in my life, so needless to say we weren't close and his passing was not overly devastating to me. In all actuality it wasn't very devastating for his entire family because he had been sick for several months so this was sort of a relief to all of them. Due to his passing I came back to Salt Lake a day earlier than expected so that I could go to his viewing and meet a ton of family that have no idea I even exist.

The viewing went well. If any of you know my mom you know that she is overly outgoing and spunky so introductions were easy for her. Oh did I mention that this is my dad's side of the family so my mom hasn't been a part of the fam for nearly 15 years yet she still was able to remember everyone even if they didn't remember her.

Now the point of this post is to introduce you to my Grandpa Steinmann. Since I was home today he and my grandma asked me to drive them to the funeral in downtown Salt Lake. They live in St. George and all the traffic makes them nervous. They are both strong and stubborn Germans, especially my grandpa. He has no qualms in expressing his opinion or speaking his mind. He is not one for big crowds and generally doesn't like conversing with people. While we were at the graveside service, my grandma was mingling with her family, I was looking at headstones (I knew nobody at the funeral and anybody I had met already forgot about me due to old age), and my grandpa was doing this:


Being a heavy smoker and not giving a crap as to what anyone thinks, he decided to depart from the crowds, light one up, and chill on the Smoot family headstone. Yep this is my grandpa. I love him.