Tilly Remembers Her Grandfather, Three Months On
The Daily- 1,635 views
- 17 Jul 2020
For the remainder of this week, “The Daily” is revisiting episodes with people we met in the early weeks of the pandemic to hear what’s happened to them since our original conversations were first aired.Climbing on the roof to look at stars in the middle of summer. Making French toast and popcorn. Kind eyes. These are some of the memories Tilly Breimhorst has of her grandfather, Craig. We spoke with Tilly in May about losing her grandfather to coronavirus. Today, we check back in with her.Guest: Matilda Breimhorst, a 12-year-old who recently lost her grandfather to the coronavirus. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily Background reading: In personal and profound ways, the coronavirus crisis has created a sense of collective loss. Here are some ways to grieve.
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Hey there, it's Michael. This week we're revisiting people we met in the early weeks of the pandemic. Listening back and hearing what's happened to them since our original conversations today, Tili Prime Horst. It's Friday, July 17th. I am re cording and it is work aying. Hey, Tilley. Hi. Hey, how are you? I'm doing OK. Tell me, what is that in your hand? Looks like either a blanket or a stuffed animal.
It's a blanket. Oh, what does it say on it?
It says powered by it.
And does it look like it has an image of pepperoni pizza on it as I am glimpsing? The baloney. That's pretty great. Well, until they I really want to thank you for getting on the phone with us. Our guest this Google Hangout with us.
And I wonder if you could tell me your full name and how old you are.
Matilda Rose Brime first and then I am.
Mm hmm. And I just start with a very simple question. How have you been feeling this past week? I'm kind of in and out of moved. Usually the two words that I'm mostly in are sad and angry.
Why do you think that your sad and angry. What about. No, we're feeling quite sad and angry because I think angry more, but it's not fair that he's gone. And I feel like sad is feeling. We're sad that he's gone and. Said that we're being sad. From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Tens of thousands of Americans have died from the corona virus. One of them was Craig Brime Horst.
Today, his granddaughter remembers him. It's Friday, May 1st. I mean, if you could tell me a little bit about your grandfather, how would you describe your grandfather physically? What did he look like? What would you wear? Those kind of things? He'd heatwave a pastor and stuff. Was he a pastor? Yes, he was the pastor. He used to be a mail man and then he'd do like that job and can't stay right here.
And then the mustache that goes right into the beard. And when I was little, I played with his beard because it just felt so interesting, touching my hands.
It felt, oh, gruff and sprightly, but like not to scraping the glasses.
Sometimes I still is blessedly like way back. And like whenever I walked into the house, he'd just be like Podio him from. But it's just it's always something he said.
Howdy, how are you. It's more interesting than hello. Yeah. Did he have any kind of nickname for you to be my one till he.
Yeah. Kiss the bride cause they just called me Tili.
Be an pendas rhymes lately part of which part rhymes Tili and then B it's just kind of like it just goes together.
Leave me. Tell me. Yeah. And then he'd always make me happy and never, like, really get upset around him, almost, that was heard. Unless you were hurt, you said. Yeah, well, because we did all sorts of crazy things. Now we need to understand some of the crazy things we did with them.
Will it take me out on the roof for it to be sleeping bags from the roof and the roof of your head of your house? No, my grandmother's house. But we didn't tell my dad about it until afterwards. Wow.
It sounds like he has a slightly mischievous quality to him.
Yeah. Can you tell me about that? What was I like? Well, it would usually be like the middle of summer and would grab the stepladder and open the window, put up the screen, climb up onto the edge of the roof, up to our special spot.
Just laid there. You and we just at the stars and talked for a while.
What kinds of things would your grandfather say?
Here, tell you, let's look for the Big Dipper. Maybe the Milky Way, if we're lucky. And Mars might be a wait. But isn't Mars a planet? Another star. You would just be a. But we can see it as a red star. Kind of. The stars were really bright and it was really warm outside. It was beautiful. How often would you see your grandfather? We wouldn't see him like every single weekend. But like a lot.
He counted my school. He'd sit in the lunchroom with me.
Wow. He would just show up. Did he announce himself? Was it unexpected?
He would never tell me that he was coming and he'd just been waiting for me right next to the lunchroom door, just waiting for me. And then I just look around for him. Every time he'd sit right next to me and I had my urge back to me, kind of just pick out things from it. And he'd take my chips and they'd be like, Papa.
He'd talk to my friends.
He'd talk about, like, all these fun things, like all the stories about like going to Tanzania and all sorts of things. And what would you think when you saw him? I think I'd be proud. I'd be proud that my grandpa comes to this, to my school or to just eat lunch with me and tell my friends all these stories.
He was just there right when I needed it to make me feel really nice.
Yeah. I don't know a lot of grandpas or grandmas who do that. That's really special. So I want you to tell me if you're willing. The story of the last few weeks and what happened with your grandfather. Yeah. And I wonder.
I don't know where you think we should start. I think we should start from the beginning. So stop by. My grandma went to the Holy Land. He wanted to take his church group there.
So they went to the Middle East. Yeah. Where Baby Jesus was born. It's like that, sir, the place. And then they got like this morning. They're an outbreak has started here of the coronavirus. And so when they came back, they were straight into quarantine. But right when they came back, people started getting really ill. Had high fever, really high fever. And in my mind at first when he was home, I was like, oh, he's fine.
He'll get through this. He's strong. But then he got worse and worse. More smells like, oh, no, it's going to happen. This is kind of a worried state. But like not like. Oh, my gosh. A really, really sad that sort of thing. Until a couple weeks later, he just couldn't do it. And he does lift into the hospital here and tell you.
Were you talking to him during this time? No, I didn't get to talk to middle man. He sort of being like letters, but I don't know if he even got to read those. I remember so when I heard about that, he was put in the hospital because it got worse. My mom was like, do you want to speak with one of his shirts? It's like, yeah. So she bought me this shirt. It's just like a greenish brown T-shirt.
Were you were you wearing it or was it just beside you? I was wearing it. If they really, really think on me, it's kind of like cold, but it felt really soothing to wear it, though. I wanted to feel like I was close to him, I was giving him a hug. I thought about him the whole night. I prayed that he wouldn't make it so that he wouldn't have to go.
But may prefer religion to. Because he had a stroke during the night from heart disease that he had. And. That made it super worse. Even if we did get him back, he wouldn't actually like you would be there, but he wouldn't be there. He couldn't do anything like that. Talk to the things that made him him.
And how did you turn the news? No, I'm gonna call. And then I looked at her and I said, no worries. So I can just. This stuff and then mommy, tell me what happened. And what did she tell you? He told me about the living will that my grandma, my dad and my uncles read it. Read it from what? The doctor meant it to them that it said that if something happened, he wanted to go.
He didn't want to have to suffer in this state.
So your grandfather had written a well that made clear that if he got very sick and he'd reached a condition where things weren't working out, that he wanted to be allowed. Yeah. And we just wanted to go to heaven is a God like he says he wanted to fall in the arms of God. That's what he wrote. Yeah, he he was the form arms. You can't use it. It's like a trust fall, really. And I. I couldn't I couldn't handle like it.
I knew that he wouldn't be coming back. He wouldn't be with me anymore. And that was hard to know.
How you holding up over there? OK. It's hard. Talking about it. But it does. It also makes me happy to talk about how great he was. It happened. You know, I've lost my grandparents to it's one of the kind of sad, inevitable things that it means to be alive, is that the people before you die in it, it's it's just really heart. It is really hard. Why are you being very brave and telling the story?
I know how difficult it must be. Thank you. We'll be right back. Hi, I'm Kristen, minds are and I'm the co-host of Innovation Uncovered, a new podcast. The world is changing in real time, often in ways we don't notice and can't predict. Innovation Uncovered explores the breakthroughs that are driving our culture now from how we play to what we consume, to how we connect. Learn more about the ideas that are reshaping our reality in extraordinary ways.
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Listen today in Basco Distributers, Inc. Can I ask you to describe sadness to me? What that feels like a feeling. It's hard. Sadness is probably like a hard one for me. Happiness too easily. But like, sadness is kind of hard.
Why is happiness easy and why is sadness hard to think?
Home? I don't know, Amy. Sam, this is an emotion that is kinda like more like deeper and it's kind of like a big, big emotion. Happiness can be big, but not as much sadness.
There's a depth to it that makes it hard to describe. Yeah. I just kind of feel like sadness is like just an ocean filled with nothing.
Have you noticed that the people around you, your parents, that they are sad to you? So. My dad will go outside a lot. You can tell that he's getting angry and he's really short tempered at that point. Mom will stay in her office. Not really doing anything, but she'll just sit around like I've seen mom try to keep crying to herself and dad, too. But I can see it. I mean, try to they're trying to shield it from you.
But I can still feel it. Do you wish that they would just do it in front of you? Yes, I do.
And why do you think they should do it more out in the open?
I feel like I can say it helps me understand my emotions. Well, like I said, a few. Do I feel that kind of gives you permission to feel the way you feel?
Yes. Like when I was talking to my dad about purple, he started crying and I started crying.
And then we just heard and this makes, you know, a lot of kids are going through what you're going through right now because of this virus. And a lot of adults are going through this. I wonder how that makes you feel.
It makes me feel like. I'm not alone. And they also kind of makes me feel a bit angry about how they see, you know, how this started. I want to know so I could figure out, like, how it would happen again. Was it a cause of a human that did it? Was the cause of an animal or was it kind of both? And if it turns out this is just something that nature and the universe gave us and it wasn't somebody who did something.
How would you feel about that?
They'd be mad. The universe. I know that a lot of people, when someone they care about or they love passes away, they end up looking for that person in the world or they end up thinking about that person unexpectedly.
Yeah, well, being that maybe they're there, they're standing by, you know, that sort of thing. Yeah. Feeling purple. That's fine. All right. But I feel like he's out there like this. I think people and helping them think their bad moments.
You know, I have a very specific sense of my grandmother whenever this song comes on, because when I was around your age, she died and a song was playing on the radio. And it was a song that made me feel sad, even though it was a love song.
And if you ever heard the song, it's by Richard Bachs. And it goes wherever you go, whatever you do, I will be right there waiting for you.
And. It always makes me think of my grandmother and her death whenever it comes on. And I wonder if you're having moments like that yet?
Yeah, I do have those type of moments, but they tended different than just a song. It's. When I saw my grandma in her backyard because we went over just to the backyard, we were allowed to get close to anyone, though. I felt I felt like she felt like sad. But I also felt kinda relieved that is is in peace now. He didn't have to deal with this bad virus. He doesn't have to feel pain or sadness or anything.
Tell me, have you gone outside and looked up at the stars since your grandfather died?
Little bit, but not much. It's not the same without being like this. Do you think that you you will do that, do you think there'll be a point when you'll want to do that? Yeah, we said we're going to go over to grandma's house. No, Daddy. That big sister. I go up to the roof and just sit down. The starts.
Tilly, I really want to thank you for spending time with us, and I want to tell you I'm sorry I am about the loss of your grandfather.
Thank you. He was really good to talk to you. Yeah, it feels good to talk to someone about it. It's good to talk. After this episode aired, Tili began receiving letters from people across the country. Some knew her grandfather and wanted to share stories of their time with him. Others wanted to tell her about their own treasured relationship with a grandparent. One listener, Lea Goldman, wrote, quote, For those lucky people like you and me, we were blessed with enough time to know our grandparents and for them to have an impact on us that will never go away.
Tilley says it's been a while since her grandfather has appeared in her dreams and that she's recently stopped wearing his shirt when she goes to bed. Tilly is spending her summer playing with her cousins and visiting places she used to go with her grandfather. Like the nature center near his house, she's also been running through sprinklers, going to the pool and playing lots of Minecraft with her friends.
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