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too.” (If you’d known him you would have.)
    The cabin was near a mountain that had a cave. During the day, Pappy would help me, Brazz, and Trace (my sister Noah wasn’t born yet) look for arrowheads and scout for bats. Pappy was a giant kid. When we’d go fishing, (Well, ... at least I went along until I got my foot stuck in a hole on the bridge and they had to cut me out before the catfish ate my toes. After that I wasn't so into fishing.) Pappy would drive ahead of us in his old-man car and my dad would follow behind, driving way too slow, never able to keep up. Dad is usually a cautious driver (except when he’s behind the wheel of a dirt bike or a four-wheeler).

    Pappy had a husky voice like me and a stomach that always stuck out a little—like he’d just had a big meal. He was always spouting folk wisdom that made no sense to some people, but it did to me (usually). If I was talking about someone who made me angry, he’d say, “The more you stomp in poo, the more it stinks,” or “When you knock ’em out, you don’t need no judge.” (That’s what he always told my dad because he used to be a boxer.) When I was wearing something—say, a hat—I’d say, “Don’t you like my hat, Pappy?” If he didn’t like it he’d say, “Oh, sure, I’d like to have two of them. One to crap on and the other to cover it up with.” Then my dad would chime in, “Yeah, me too.” And I’d say, “I have no clue what either one of you is talking about.” It didn’t matter, though. He was just the best granddad I can imagine.
    Pappy was always a good audience. The staircases in his cabin led to an upstairs loft, and when I was a little kid—five or six—I’d put on a show, belting out “Tomorrow” from Annie as I came down the stairs. Pappy would clap and whistle and say, “Go on up there and do it again.” I ate it up. And when I was at the cabin, I always played his piano. I never took piano lessons, but I liked—and still like—letting my fingers tinkle around the keys. Pappy called that tinkling “The Rain Song.”
    That’s how I ended up writing the song “I Miss You” for Pappy. He was so sick. I knew he was dying, and slowly so did my heart. I couldn’t imagine life without him. It was the hardest song for me to write. I was working on it with my mom’s good friend Wendi, and it was just killing me. Finally I said, “I can’t write anymore. I gotta stop.” But I knew what my heart wanted to say, and whatever’s in my heart finds its way to my fingertips. So we pushed on and finished the song. I really wanted Pappy to hear “I Miss You” before he died. I never got to sing it for him, but toward the end my dad played Pappy a quick cut of the song, and I like to believe that it gave him hope, like he continues to give me hope.
    Pappy said he refused to die before Hannah Montana aired on TV for the first time, but he passed away two days before the premiere. Still, he did get to see a tape of the pilot. I know he was proud.
    In the South, funerals are like weddings. Everyone shows up in big hats to gossip and pay their respects. It’s practically a family reunion. At Pappy’s funeral I couldn’t see anything but my granddad. There was an open casket and I wanted to touch his hand one last time, to say good-bye. But I didn’t want to remember him that way, so I stayed back. That moment still haunts me.
    After Pappy died, I kept circling around his death. If you’ve lost a grandparent, maybe you know how that goes. I missed him. I still do. I mourned him. I still do. I kept thinking about how I promised I’d let him take my older sister Brandi and me to King’s Island (an amusement park), but never got a chance. I got stuck on the times I didn’t talk to him on the phone. There was a voice mail from Pappy saved on our answering machine, and I listened to it over and over again, because every time it brought him back as if he’d never left.
    Then I had a dream. It was Pappy, wanting