I have not written in over a month, because sometimes life just happens. Sometimes you get a puppy the week before Christmas and spend the next four weeks in a tailspin. (I do try and plan for such occasions and have a backlog of writings for these moments).
We also lost a family member over the Christmas holidays. I am reminded with events like this that there are certain rituals that many families do, perhaps the greatest of which is actually seeing one another. Yet, while there were many people I either met for the first time or had not seen since the last family wedding, the person I got to reconnect with the most was my own brother. We live about 25 minutes from one another and love each other very much. But life has been busy for each of us, and the last time we were together without any other family or friends around us was six years ago. We met for a quick lunch when my daughter was about six months old. He wanted to check in on his baby sister and encourage me in whatever ways I needed. Had I known then that a moment like this would not take place again for over half a decade, I would have stayed longer and tried better to remember exactly what we talked about. But as life marched along, so too did the past six years. It took the Good Lord to bring us all together in ways almost forgotten.
Growing up, my brother was the rock of my life. Naval duties meant Dad would need to be away, and Mom had to raise kiddos and keep a house going. So often it felt like “my brother and I against the world,” and he really did a wonderful job as an older brother. We were not without our sibling squabbles, but he really was a guide and constant in my life. When I had my first heartbreak at seventeen and, in despair, asked my parents if I could, “go see ‘Bubba’,” there was a sense of relief for myself and my parents that I had him to run to. A big brother at college combined with his future wife who let you borrow her shirt to “go out on the town” can mend just about any young heart.
Fast forward to post Christmas 2023 and my brother and I are in a car driving five or so hours to Pittsburgh. Our spouses stay with kiddos as this is a busy time, and getting everyone together for a two day trip with eight days notice was not in the cards. So it is just myself and him on this journey. We catch up on each other's lives and children (and animals) in only a way siblings can. There can be a safety in talking with a sibling that you don’t get with anyone else. Poo-Pooing aspects of one’s life is not judged, and there are inside jokes that are officially now old enough to vote.
There is also a musical soundtrack to the journey. A different one than I, in fact, intended. I brought a compact disc for us to listen to, a book on CD. My delightful brother stares at me like I pulled out an 8 track and questioned where we were going to play that, as his vehicle did not have such arcane technology. My brother pulled out his phone and synced it to his car, via the air, and brought up a musical playlist for the travels. Not only did I love this playlist of melodies mashed with words, I became abundantly aware of the fact that I did not have a musical love curated out of my own will. I have always seen the genre of music I gravitated towards as a young adult as my own, void of all influence, and a complete representation of just me. As it turns out, my musical tastes are completely that of my older brother - a hard blow to this emo rocker.
So as the songs of mine and my brother's youth play us along our journey to the family gathering, I am able to reflect on having him in my life. We have made our own families and curated our own lives, just like those playlists of old. But, I didn’t have to make that drive alone. I didn’t have to listen to kids bop or watch my words about members of my extended family, as one must do on some family road trips. I shared this family moment in a way that one can only do with close family.
My own daughter will not know the relief of carrying a trying family time together with a sibling. She will find, I hope, “chosen family” that will feel thicker than blood and support her in the same way. I am lucky that there is no animosity between my brother and myself. I am lucky that we live so close and like the same music…and that he doesn't mind driving. Because the same relief that washed over myself and my parents all those years ago as a broken hearted teen who asked to go see her brother, was felt once again when we decided that it just made sense to drive over together.
