Remembering My Grandpa Gene

I had the honor of representing our family and speaking at my grandpa's funeral on Tuesday, Dec. 5, 2017. This is my ALL TIME FAVORITE photo of me and my grandpa. We ALWAYS had fun, no matter what we were doing. I'm also including my speech for those who were snowed in during the funeral, and for those who just want a few short stories to remember what an awesome guy he was. He was truly loved and will be deeply missed.

Today (Dec. 5, 2017) I have the honor of reintroducing you all to one of my favorite people, Eugene Willard Peterson, better known as Gene, dad, or in my case – grandpa.

Looking around, I would bet that each and every one of you can think back over the years and remember at least one or two stories where my grandpa made you laugh so hard that you were either crying, unable to breath, or rolling on the floor… that’s just the kind of man he was. He would do anything to put a smile on your face and make you laugh. He was a goofball, a chatterbox, and forever a kid at heart.

Even as a child my grandpa was a character. One of my great grandma Harriet’s go-to stories was about my grandpa’s fear of needles. He was so afraid of them, that when the family cows were supposed to be vaccinated, he insisted on ‘supervising’ from a fence post nearby. When his favorite cow got a shot, he passed out and fell right off of the post he’d been sitting on. That’s just how passionately he loved his cow I guess, but no livestock would ever compare to the love he felt for Deloris Lorraine Senger.

At 75 years old, he’d accomplished a lot in his life; but my grandma Deloris would always joke that it was a miracle he ever made it past his teenage years. But if you asked grandpa about his teenage years he had one memory that always stuck out – and that was meeting my grandma at age 16. He would always say, “I’ve been in love with the same woman my whole life,’ then he’d pause a little bit, give his trademark Gene Peterson smirk and say, “I made her wait to get married though, I knew she wasn’t going anywhere...” Then he’d start giggling like a little school girl.

Grandpa spent the past 75 years having the time of his life - snowmobiling, fishing, boating, laughing with friends and growing anything that was green. He loved to play. Bowling, cards, cribbage, poker – whatever you could do with your friends to socialize and have fun… and it was always a bonus when he could take their money.

If you ever looked up the definition for social butterfly you would find ‘Gene Peterson.’ That man was the BEST storyteller – the problem was... he would pick his all-time favorite stories and you would hear them EVERY time he saw you... but even though he was telling the same stories for the past 50 years, he would be giggling through them the entire time, like it was the first time he’d ever told them. So you’d still end up laughing in the end.

Some of the highlights from his story reel would be turning a massive hay bail into a giant turkey in Darrel and Anne Roseland's yard... Teaming up with Darrel to give Dave Sandstrom a goat for his birthday... And when he was walking my mom Shelly down the aisle he said he was going to hug Sam and shake my mom’s hand, because my dad was quote, “taking my grandpa’s biggest liability off of his hands…”

One of the stories I got to hear whenever I saw him was a story that always ended with he beaming. It happened when I was about two or three years old. Grandpa and I went on one of our usual Gene and Haley dates – no matter how old I got he and I would go out, just the two of us and have dinner or see a movie, whatever it was… just to bond. Because I was a toddler during this particular outing he took me to the play area in McDonald’s. He was hanging out at the table while I was on the slide... when a little boy came up to him and started chatting him up. But the reason he loved this story so much is because after a few minutes of talking to this boy I noticed what was happening. I promptly strode up, put my hands on my hips, looked that boy in the eyes and yelled, “Hey, that’s my grandpa!” (Later on I had to learn how to share – with my sister, and cousins, but he was definitely still mine). And to this day, almost 20 years later, that story would still make him laugh.

Outside of his crops, and being the luckiest card-player on the planet, my grandpa’s pride and joy was his family. When he wasn’t in the fields he was watching Sue and Shelly play softball or basketball, he was always the loudest in the stands. Then when us grandkids got older, we could always count on grandpa to show up for soccer, basketball, and rugby games – he even sat through quite a few track and diving meets. And you could always count on him to make fun of all the other athletes competing. My favorite part of grandpa's color commentary was his endless one liners... For example, this fall he and I went to quite a few of Caitlin and Courtney’s soccer games… but when he’d be watching someone and they would consistently get beat by an opponent he would yell, “Come on pokey!” or “That girl is slower than a mud turtle!” Then we’d spend the rest of the game laughing, cheering, and trying to shush grandpa whenever that player’s parents were nearby – not that that ever stopped him.

These are just a few of the lovable quirks that made my grandpa so special. And this is just a short list of the hundreds and hundreds of things he did that my family and I will miss and remember him by. I hope that all of you, like us, can look back at your time with my grandpa with fondness, a big smile on your face and a whole lot of laughter. And that’s exactly what my grandpa would want. Because where there is laughter, there is love.