My Father, his Father

I never knew my dad except for the few stories told by others. Those stories were old because by the time I recognized them for what they were a lot of information had been lost through the aging process. He was killed in India before I was even six months old. He was a Jr. and since we share the name that makes me a III. Some folks get really tickled when they find out what my given name is.
My father's father, aka Grandpa, isn't nearly the mystery to me that my father is. He does share the title of Grandpa with my mom's dad. I only wish that I had known him longer. Unfortunately, ten years is all that we were given. But in that time I learned two significant things about the man. The first - he enjoyed driving his Buick.
The other - he loved baseball, particularly listening to the San Francisco Seals on the radio.
He did not, however, do both at the same time. I am certain that he would have something to say about cell phones and driving. His attitude was that operating the car required all of the driver's attention.
His love of baseball overcame that view once that I am aware of. In this particular instance Grandpa and I had gone somewhere that had allowed him to tune in the ball game on the radio while he waited for me to complete something. He probably wouldn't have turned it on had he known that the game wouldn't be completed before he had to drive home. In any event when I got into the car the game was already in extra innings so we waited for it to end... and we waited some more... then a little longer. The Seals were playing the Oakland Oaks, their arch rivals and Grandpa was determined to hear it through to the end. That meant that he was going to have to make an exception to the no listening while driving rule if we were going to get home to Grandma before she burnt dinner even more than usual.
Back then, in the early '50s, driving from the South Peninsula to the Mid Peninsula was an adventure in any case because there were no freeways. Besides Grandpa didn't drive on major highways anyway. On this occasion he wasn't even venturing onto minor highways. He was good. There is a relatively direct route through residential neighborhoods from Menlo Park to San Mateo. It only takes about an hour to drive what normally would be ten miles.
I cant remember the outcome of the game, but I remember it ended about the time we got home.