He, my dad and I were catching a flight to Florida, and everywhere we went in the terminal, his remarks weren’t unlike that first one — eager but confused.

He used words like “zoo” to describe getting through airport security and “a bunch bums” for all the people who crossed the terminal every which way.

But I couldn’t blame him.

After all, this was his first time at the airport, his first time scrambling through security and navigating the terminal, and it was his first time ever on an airplane.

At first, I’d been surprised. The World War II veteran who taught me to play Rummy, the man who I’ve always called “Puppa” — he had never flown before.

We were to visit with my great aunt and uncle, my dad’s cousins and a whole slew of relatives I’d never met for the next two days.

Both my grandma and a great uncle on my dad’s side died within the last year, and this trip was something my grandpa called “the last roundup.”

During the entire flight, Puppa kept his nose pressed against the window, his eyes scanning the landscape we passed over at 35,000 feet. Every once in a while, he’d watch the engines, fascinated by the mechanics of it all.

It was almost moving how he took hold of every moment, taking in the experience, and I appreciated him for this. But that whole weekend, I would find myself confronted with things I take for granted.

After the flight landed, we drove to my Great Aunt Doris' horse ranch in Ocala, Fla. There waiting in the driveway was my Great Uncle Art with a video camera on a tripod to capture our arrival.

My dad had brought his research into our family tree with him on the trip. It dated back in one area to 300 B.C. and to Scottish royalty in another, but there were a lot of holes he hoped his Aunt Doris could fill in.

He’d given me the explanation of the family tree before, and it just never stuck with me. It was only that weekend that I appreciated it — being surrounded by the people whose names it included and hearing their stories.

Now, I’m kicking myself for not taking the time to get know these family members sooner. I wish I could’ve heard their stories before, seen those photos. I wish I took more photos, or even remembered to look out an airplane window to soak in the view.

As students, we don’t always take the time to do these things. Between classes, work and social lives, life just moves too fast. It really is “a jungle” out there.

I may joke about the things Puppa said and did because I know he grew up in a different time. His word choices and experiences are completely different from mine.

He doesn’t know a lot of things, like that you need an Amazon account to order books for your Kindle because the device doesn’t come with them built-in. He doesn’t know what Twitter is or the difference between WiFi and an Ethernet cable.

Some people might say that means he’s a bit out-of-touch with today’s reality. But that weekend, it really took someone like him to pull me right back down to it.