Goldfish Lessons

My granddaughter Emma calls me 'zombie grandpa,' though she says it with love. I suppose I do shuffle a bit in the mornings before my coffee kicks in, my joints stiff from seventy-five years of living. She's seven, with the same spark her grandmother had at that age, and she's taken it upon herself to help me feed the goldfish each morning.

The pool in our backyard has been home to three generations of goldfish now. I brought the first ones home in a glass bowl when Emma's mother was small, just like my father did for me in 1952. Those orange flashes darting through crystal water taught me patience - you can't rush a feeding, and you certainly can't rush life.

'Grandpa, you're staring again,' Emma says, tapping my knee with her small foot. 'Are you thinking about Grandma?'

I nod. Some days, the grief pools in my chest like still water. Other days, it flows like the fountain in the corner of the pool, constant and life-giving. Miriam loved watching the fish too, right up until the end.

'Tell me about the zombie again,' Emma demands, swinging her legs.

'Same as always,' I say. 'Your great-grandfather fought in a big war. He came home different - hollow, like something had eaten the person he was. But he learned to live again, slowly, like these fish learning to trust my hand above the water.'

The real zombies aren't the ones in movies. They're the ones who stop loving, stop hoping, stop seeing the beauty in a morning feeding ritual. My father chose life, chose joy, chose to fill his pool with living things instead of dwelling in darkness.

Emma sprinkles fish food carefully, one flake at a time. 'I'm going to have goldfish when I'm old,' she declares. 'And my grandpa will come visit and be a zombie too.'

I laugh, and it feels like sunlight breaking through clouds. The goldfish rise, their orange scales catching the morning light, and I know that some things - love, wonder, the simple act of caring for small living things - will never really die. They just swim on, feeding new generations, circling through the deep waters of memory and hope.