Mr. James V. Crandall, age 79 of Florence, passed away on March 18, 2024. Elkins Funeral Home is assisting the family.
Mr. Crandall was a man of many talents and interests. He enjoyed the art of bonsai and cross stitch. His family describes him as a man before his time and an outdoorsman that didn’t like the outdoors.
Mr. Crandall is survived by his loving wife, Carolyn “Cookie” Crandall; children, Michelle Wisdom (David) and Jason Crandall (Michelle); grandchildren, Christopher Browder (Hannah), Victoria Browder (Britani), Mason Crandall, Hunter Crandall (Cassie), and Rachel Crandall; and brother, Hal Crandall (Debbie). He is preceded in death by his parents, James Victor Crandall, Sr. and Muriel Smith.
“I’m different, hard – working,
and idle too;
I have a goal and yet I’m aimless!
I don’t all of me, fit in; I’m awkward,
shy and rude,
nasty and good – natured.
I love it when sharp edge blur.
Many opposites meet in me:
from West to East,
from envy to delight.
I know you insist on the “compact monolith.”
But it is the opposites that have vast value!
You need me. I’m heaped as high
as a truck of fresh – mown hay.
I fly through voices, light, and warbling,
with butterflies in my eyes and hay sticking out of cracks.
I greet all that moves! Ardent desire,
and eagerness, triumphant eagerness!
Frontiers are in my way. I am embarrassed
not to know Buenos Aires and New York;
Id like to walk at will through London streets
and talk with everyone I want, even in broken English.
Id like to ride through Paris in the morning
hanging on the back of a bus like a boy.
I want art to be as diverse as myself;
and even if art brings trouble,
and harass me on every side,
I am besieged – beseiged by art.
I’ve seen myself in every sort of thing:
I feel close to Yesenin and Walt Whitman,
Moussorgsky with the whole stage in his embrace,
and Gauguin tracing his virgin line.
I like to skate in winter,
write poems through sleepless nights;
I like to mock an enemy to his face,
and carry a woman across a stream.
I bite into books, and carry firewood;
I can feel depressed, and know vaguely what I seek.
In hottest August I love to crunch
an ice – cool slice of watermelon.
With no thought of death I sing and drink,
fall on the grass with arms outspread,
and if I should die in this wide world,
then I’ll die most happy to have lived. “
