My Grandpa (the last Russian)

Each time my dad and his dad got together, I recalled shouting at high decibels.
Grandpa, the last of the family to be born in Russia (1884-1964) had never changed our Russian name because he was worried that he would be detained and returned to the homeland to answer charges.
Well, grandpa would invariably walk into the room where the family was watching a Yankee game.
He scoffed at the proceedings and said in his broken English, heavy with Yiddish.
Baseball! What are you wasting your time with. Baseball!
My dad, who had tried baseball for a living before starting his career with FDNY in the same year that Joe D began to play center field for the Bombers, wagged a finger in his father’s direction.
67,000 people in the Stadium, pop! 67,000 people and you want to know who is wasting their time. What? Are you out of your mind?
My grandfather’s shoulders sagged and he slunk from the room as if he was a banished child.
I never felt as sad for a human being as I did for my grandpa that day in the Bronx.