Harold Canute Buckingham Jr.

A year after his passing a lot has changed and a lot has stayed the same. He was the last of my grandparents. He would’ve loved that I used writing to help process the grief associated with his death. The following is a “speech” I wrote last June to help me through the grieving process. I hope you enjoy.

For those of you who don’t know me, I am the second grandson to be almost named Harold Canute Buckingham the IV. For some reason I didn’t end up with it though. I always thought Canute was an interesting Name middle or otherwise, and those of you at Seabury who knew my Grandfather, likely saw the drawing of King Cnut and the tide on his door and if you were lucky, he had sat you down to tell you the story. For those that were not lucky enough to have this cherished memory, let me try to emulate it as best I can. King Cnut, after conquering England, and a large chunk of western europe, sat down on the beach and figures “I’m the most powerful person in the world, the King of all this land, I sit here and I command the tide and waves not to come in and wet my feet.” Of course as he sits there, the tide comes and the waves come. Cnut’s feet get wet. King Cnut, humbled, throws his crown into the ocean and walks off. He admits that at the will of God and nature, he is just a man. It is through his humility that he sees this. Now anyone who knows Harold, knows his humble nature. He never talked down or up to anyone and was always willing to listen to what you had to say. Maybe it was his willingness to listen and take interest in everything that made him one of the busier 90 year olds I’ve had the pleasure of knowing. That man was always planning an adventure or digging into something, just scratching at everything in the world around him that captivated his interest. While doing this, he never shied away from something that he didn’t understand, he was always willing to learn something new in order to pursue whatever it was that was of interest. My brother and father can attest to hours of teaching him this or that so he could use his computer more efficiently or answer emails more quickly. Joyce’s love for him not only tolerated, but encouraged these pursuits allowing them both to live healthy active lives into their old age. 

In his last days, it was these very tasks, these interests and loose ends that he had not yet finished, that were holding him up. The final tide was coming in and Grandpa wasn’t ready to get his feet wet. He didn’t want to throw in his crown, not yet, there was too much still to do, but he had forgotten what King Cnut had taught him, that he, like us in here, are just humans. In these last days, he taught all of us a lesson about our lives and how best to live them. My dad had expressed some anxiety, likely shared with his sisters, about finishing all the loose ends Grandpa had left. He had a lot of projects left unfinished. There was still so much to learn. There was still so much curiosity in him. I say to them and to everyone, you don’t have to finish them. You will never arrive at the completion of life’s tasks. You will never be done. The joy should be found in doing them, as Grandpa enjoyed digging into his family tree, finding historic graveyards, or listening to someone’s sorry. But I say this to them and to everyone else, if there is something you’ve been waiting to do, go do it, not to check it off the list or come to some metaphysical arrival, but to have an adventure. Go out and experience the world, just as Harold and Joyce did. It is what they would’ve wanted for all of us.