My grandpa had this radio. An old one, big, wooden, heavy as hell. It sat in his bedroom, next to the window that never opened properly. To be honest, the radio was old and ugly. I sometimes wondered why he wouldn't just throw it away.
The knobs were so old that they fell when you touched it, and the glass dial was cracked like a spider web. Sometimes if you turned it on, nothing. Dead silence. Sometimes it just blasted static so loud you thought it was possessed. Grandpa used to smack the side of it with his palm like he was scolding it, and then, sometimes, it worked.
I used to ask him why he didn't dispose it and get a new one. Even a cheap one from the market. He’d just laugh or chew his sugarcane and ignore me. But one time, I really pressed him, and he gave me a serious look and said, “This radio carried voices when I had none.”
Now, I didn’t get it. At all. I thought it was one of those weird old-people sayings, you know, like when they say things that sound deep but don’t actually mean anything. So I rolled my eyes and forgot about it. Or at least, I thought I forgot.
Years later, I understood. He told me little bits when I was older. About the war. About how everyone in the village lived half afraid, half waiting for bad news. Sometimes no school, no shops, nothing moving. Just silence and fear. And the radio was the only way they knew the world outside was still alive. The only proof that somewhere people were laughing, singing, falling in love. He said once a love song played on it while they could literally hear gunfire far away. Imagine that. Music and war mixing together in one night.
Anyway, fast forward. Life happened, as it does. I grew up, stopped visiting as often, started thinking I had more important things to do. That’s the part I regret. You always think there’ll be more time, right? But one day my dad called me and said, “Come. Grandpa’s not well.”
When I saw him, he was thinner, weaker, the strong voice he always had was softer, but his eyes… man, his eyes were still the same. And guess what was still sitting in that same spot by the bed? Yep. The radio. Dustier, quieter, but still there like it was waiting for him.
I asked, joking a bit, “Does this thing still even work?” And Grandpa gave me this crooked smile and said, “Sometimes, when it feels like it. Just like me.”
That night, I couldn’t sleep, so I sat there messing with it. Turned the knobs, smacked it, cursed at it (yeah I did, don’t judge me). And suddenly it came alive. Static first, then a faint voice. Couldn’t even tell the language, but it was something. And Grandpa’s face lit up. He just whispered, “See? The world still moves.”
That line. "The world still moves." It stuck in me like a nail.
After he passed, family members were dividing his properties, taking what they wanted, as they saw fit. My uncles wanted the land, my cousins wanted some books, someone even wanted his cane. I didn’t care about any of that. All I told them I wanted was his old radio. They laughed at me like I was stupid. They didn't understand that I now shared grandpa's sentiment.
“That broken thing? What will you do with it?” But I didn’t care. I knew what it meant. It was more than a radio. It was a reminder of something extraordinary.
Now it’s in my apartment. It doesn’t really work anymore, no matter how much I smack it. But sometimes I sit beside it when things don’t go as they should. Like when I'm out of a job, when the bills pile up, making me feel overwhelmed, when I'm unsure about what the future holds, or when I fight with a loved one, and don’t know how to resolve it.
Yes, it's just a radio. It's not magical or supernatural. But my grandfather’s bond with the radio wasn’t random. Maybe it was written in the stars that one day it would sit in my apartment, dusty but present, reminding me what he already knew that no matter the static, no matter the silence, and no matter the situation, the world still moves, and always will.