A Tribute to Granddad Macchi – Ole Bob
February22
Adam and I regret not being able to be here due to the loss of my mother. However, I’m grateful we’re able to share our memories with you tonight.
Tonight I honor a man who wore many hats, Robert Macchi – a great grandfather, a grandfather, a father, a brother, a close friend, and a follower of our Lord Jesus Christ. Of these, I’d like to share who he is to me – a grandfather.
I never knew my grandfathers growing up. I wish I did because I heard they were well-respected men. I was unfortunate to not be graced by their presence. Adam, Seth, and Shana are blessed to have known their grandparents all these years. And I’ve had the great privilege of getting to know Ole Bob (as he’d put it). If my grandfathers were alive, I hope they’d be a lot like him. Now, I can say, without hesitation, I’ve been blessed having him as my granddad.
Every week Adam, the girls, and I visited Granddad: talking, sharing meals, and taking countless naps on his reclining sofa. We often relaxed on lawn chairs on his lawn. And for those of you who have shared a sunny Florida day with him, you know how common it was to see him enjoy a day like that outside. We’d watch our girls run around the yard, pick oranges in the groves with him, and ride in their red wagon as he pulled them.
Not many are fortunate to know their grandparents but our girls are blessed to know their great-grandfather, known to them as Poppi. I’ve watched them scream Poppi’s name as I drove up his driveway. The sweet hugs and kisses he gave them from the time we arrived to the time we departed are just a few of the things we’ll miss.
Ole Bob now lives in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ. A place where his body does not feel any more pain. A place of peace where he joins his love, Jean who he’s longed to reunite with for many years. Our time spent with him lives within us as we continue to remember our love for him.
By Adam:
At once tough, compassionate and kind-hearted, my granddad was full of contradictions.
The son of Italian immigrants, Robert Macchi began work at a young age during The Great Depression. I guess this instilled in him his work ethic and the necessity to ensure we’d eaten everything on our plate whenever he’d take us to dinner! Self depricating, Bob would descibe himself as someone barely smart enough to turn on the light. But he was a smart man who saw the fruit of his hard work and ingenuity in the success of his orange groves. But his great joy was people. He gave generously to his church, because he believed in it. He helped people whenever he could. And he loved his daughter and sons, his grandkids and great grandkids. He was very proud of them.
Adventurous enough to travel the globe and desire to go to China to preach the gospel, Bob Macchi was also a creature of habit. He had his favorite restaurants where everyone knew him. He wasn’t ever afraid to walk right in and find his seat. The host would just watch in amazment while we, embarrassed, would try to explain that, “He’s an old man after all and just leave things be, we don’t want to start anything.”
And he could embarass you: At McDonalds, when the person behind the register asked if he needed anything else, Granddad would often ask them for a smile. They would stare at him in disbelief. But he wouldn’t pay, until he got a smile. Reluctantly they’d offer a smirk. And he’d relent and pay them.
He enjoyed his silly phone greetings: “Joe’s Bar and Grill, you kill it we grill it!” “Joe’s mortuary, you stab ‘em we slab ‘em!”
And his predictable idioms: Every meal had to be rated from 1 to 10. And if a meal was really good, it was “Terrible. Just terrible.”
Some of my fondest memories remain the times he and Granny would pick us up at our house and we’d go feed the ducks at Lake Eola. We would stuff ourselves full of white bread, which was not allowed at our home, and save a few crumbs for the ducks.
When I was older, I’d spend my Saturdays mowing his lawn and grove. A task that would take all day. I loved doing it. I grew to love the groves and the smell of the orange trees. Ole Bob always sported his khaki shirt and trousers and brown shoes. He was working when I got there and continued after I was exhausted and done for the day. He always did work hard.
He could catch you off guard with an insight that would leave you wondering where it came from.
I asked him once if he could do it all over again, what he would do differently. He said he wouldn’t worry. He recounted the time his groves froze in the 80’s and he had a talk with God and from then on he trusted God and not himself. Now I knew he struggled with anxieties and fears, even after that encounter. But he deferred to God from that point on.
As he aged he softened from a tough, hard working, Depression-Era kid from New Jersey, to a citrus man who worked from sun-up to sun-down to a man who prayed dearly for his loved ones. I recall him telling me when my mom was sick that he’d pleaded with God to take him and not her. He really meant it. He was rough around the edges but soft on the inside.
To this day I hear new stories about the people who’ve been encouraged by Ole Bob. I will miss him dearly. But God has work for him to do elsewhere. And I have no doubt he’s working very hard at it. Probably wearing his khaki shirt and slacks and brown shoes. And I imagine God encouraging him, telling him what a great job he’s doing.