Nothing Little About It

 For all of you out there who are currently reading this, I will let you know way in advance that this is directed to a very small segment of my audience. Today this will be an audience of one. Not that the rest of you won't take the same level of amusement and grim satisfaction from reading these accounts that you might otherwise be enjoying if I were writing about gun control or public education. I hope you'll stick around for a few lines about my younger brother. 

It's his birthday today, and he has confided in me that though he is a constant and dedicated follower of this blog, he is always looking for stories about him. Which makes perfect sense, like those trips through family photo albums, you tend to feel a greater sense of comfort when you can pick yourself out of the crowd. "I was there."

My brother Dan was there. Pretty much the whole time I was growing up. He had a ringside seat to my life, and yet he still feels compelled to come around here looking for memories and anecdotes that take him back there once again. We share a past, and through some savvy relocation, we share a present as well. He lives just across a bridge from me, and though I don't see him every morning for breakfast like we used to, it's so very nice to have a little blood just across the bay. 

When I was in the throes of my tumultuous adolescence, I struggled and failed to stick the landing on my first attempt to go away to college. That long and deathly embarrassing drive home in the family station wagon was only made better by one thing: The calm voice of reason that came from my little brother. He was the one who spoke up and said that he guessed that I would be okay. Never mind the mess in the dorm room the night before. He spoke up on my behalf when I did not have a shred of belief in myself. Turns out he was right, "Okay" being a relative term and all. 

Then, there was the crisis point after my father was horribly burned in a plane crash. We all gathered together at my older brother's house and alternately took turns driving down to the hospital and sitting at home by the phone, awaiting word. When it finally came down to the moment of disembarkation, deciding when or if we should take dad off life support, it was Dan's calm and assured voice that cut through the fear and confusion. "He gets better or we pull the plug." A harsh assessment to be sure, but the words that someone had to say. 

Since then, we have come together to tell stories and laugh. He loves to hear me remember things. He should know that he is the reason for me being able to recall all those days wandering in the hills, or playing with the neighborhood kids. He is a part of my life that sparks those memories and the one that keeps showing up to keep me digging for more. 

There is a chance that you have come by this entry at Dan's behest. He tutors folks on Al Gore's Internet using bits and pieces of my blog from time to time as material to read. That's the kind of flattery that serves us both, and especially today. It's Dan's birthday and I want you all to know that I probably wouldn't be doing this (gestures widely) without him out there to give me his personal thumbs up. 

Thank you for reading this blog.