When I was 6 months old, you convinced my mother that, although I had very few teeth, I could totally handle my own candy cane, 

 

Then proceeded to feed them to me daily 

 

Around that time, you also liked to wear matching hats and take lots of pictures mimicking my annoyed, crying baby faces

 

When I was a wee tot, you placed an oversized, prank condom on my head and took pictures. Several pictures.

 

Around the age of four, you let me puff on your pipe, and occasionally your cigar

 

You would always yell whenever teeth were used as applesauce openers, your entire career was against tooth mistreatment

 

It was encouraged that when visiting your house, clothing was optional, therefore whenever I would visit, all I wore were hats and shoes

 

You encouraged life

 

 

At the age of five, you were ripped from the world of the living

 

Your vices had finally caught up with you, and I was lost in the aftermath

 

My world shattered before I really knew what 'shattered' meant. 

 

At the age of 13, I had forgotten your smile

 

By 14, your laugh

 

How does someone so influential and full of life fade from memory? 

 

15, you were fragments of memories, playing like broken records in my head

 

16, nothing more than someone labelled 'Pappy' in my scrapbook