Big Brothers

Deborah Venable

05/29/02

They say that pay back is hell. I can’t agree that this is always the case. It much depends on the debt being “paid back.”

I have just spent a few days visiting with my only sibling, whom I have mentioned before briefly in other writings. I may have mentioned that he is probably the reason for my initial interest in writing. I can’t really say if I would have been so inspired without his example set at an early age.

When I decided to establish my own website to publish my writings, I began at once to badger my big brother into sending me articles for posting, because I wanted the best examples of the written word on my website. He has been consistent in denying me those desires up until he surprised me this past weekend with an essay he had written about none other than myself and his recollections from our childhood. I called it his revenge for my badgering, but I broke my neck to get it published from long distance via a crippled remote computer because I was so thankful and so impressed with the quality of his writing - as always. He has promised me others, and I will hold him to it.

My brother is seven years my senior. It used to be a huge difference when we were younger, but as life’s plan would have it, the more years we live on this earth, the more years it takes to make a difference in relationships. We are finally peers in experience, and we are uniquely bonded to each other through personal history.

Oddly enough, my earliest memories of my brother contain no negative feelings of animosity. He was just always there for me to model after, learn from, and pester unmercifully. He set the standard for my aspirations early on. He was an avid reader; therefore, it is small wonder why I followed in his footsteps. I would pretend to read before I actually could – just because he was doing it. Had he jumped off a cliff when I was young enough, I would have most definitely followed. I remember working in the yards during the hot Alabama summer one year, and being admonished by our prim and proper mother for removing my shirt when he did. Little did I accept the fact that society had different expectations from different genders. I only knew that my brother set the standards for actions and behaviors.

He is right – I do have a hair-trigger temper, (probably inherited from our father), which I developed at an early age. The baseball bat incident is quite true I’m ashamed to say, but if it resulted in the “revenge” of meeting my husband, I will be forever grateful for its occurrence. The other shameful thing I did to my brother when we were both young, he managed to get a much quicker revenge for. I knew he had an uncontrollable fear of wasps, yet I deliberately locked him in our dark tool shed with a couple of nests of them, and went quietly about my business for hours as he spent what must have been a most miserable afternoon. I was properly punished for my thoughtless act via a well placed “switching” from our mother – but his revenge came a short while later.

Unlike my brother, I loved to climb trees. We had many fine trees for climbing on our property, and I managed to make good use of them all. There were some trees unsuited for my antics, as I was to find out, the day I decided to climb our cherry tree. This was a very large cherry tree, but as I recall, the branches were small and close together, making it a poor choice for getting out of once you were stupid enough to insert your small frame into the higher reaches of it. My brother was in charge of a friend and me the day I got stuck in our cherry tree. When it was apparent that I would remain wedged in said tree unless I received outside assistance, my friend and my pitiful wailings and nervous giggles summoned my brother to lend such assistance. It was as if God had handed him a golden opportunity to milk my plight for all it was worth – and he gratefully accepted the gift. We both knew my parents would be less than pleased to arrive home and find me in my predicament, so he stretched out his joy just long enough to extract the most suffering from me before becoming my savior in the end. It was effective in showing me that I was vulnerable to revenge, so I don’t recall any deliberately mean acts against him after that incident. Oh – and it taught me NOT to climb the cherry tree.

I do not believe my brother ever made an enemy. He was not spared the normal scuffles of boyhood or even the few bar brawls that go along with being a fun loving sailor, but everyone who ever knew him held him in the highest esteem and still do. That takes a special character. I cannot say the same for myself because I have never been accused of being “easy-going” at all. That IS my brother’s forte.

As we both near those golden years of knowing how little we know about everything in the world, we find a commonality in thought about world affairs, the importance of good friends, and the immeasurable comfort of family. As we continue to sort it all out, it is nice to know that we can write it down so we won’t forget in the fog of old age.

God never made a better person, and He certainly threw away the mold He used for my big brother. May we all be blessed with more of his written insights, (as he puts it when I badger him), as soon as he and God get done with them.

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