Brothers and Sisters

My brother called me the other night and we talked longer than I think we ever have. The topics ranged from the health of our dad to when my brother still lived at home, and even dipped into talk of our relationships (an uncharted venture in some respects).
My brother means a lot to me, and I take his opinions and words to heart.
He’s been everything from my protector to my trampoline.
Once when I was about four, I had a set of play kitchen toys. One was a plastic mixer that really worked in short spurts if you kept pushing a button on the top. My mom let me mix up a dish of instant chocolate pudding with it to “help make dinner”. It didn’t set up well in the fridge. It stayed runny and had unmixed lumps of powder in it. I’m sure it was horrible enough on its own merit. But my brother went on and on about what a good cook I was and begged for a second helping. It really made me feel so special! I didn’t know until a couple years later that ever since he was two or three himself, he’s had a profound hatred of chocolate! What a great big brother!
We talked about how when he was still at home, I rarely ever ran to my mom or dad when I was scared in the middle of the night. I’d always make a bee-line right to his room, but I’d just stand there being too scared to wake him up for fear of being sent back to my own room. I knew that if I even was just *standing* in his room, I’d be safe from whatever monsters and boogeymen were lurking around the house. Eventually, he’d sense me standing there and flip up the covers and say, “come on, Sissy… jump in” and that’s where my doll and I would stay until someone was rude enough to wake us so he could go off to school.
Christmas of 1971, my brother had just turned 16, and I had just turned three. That year for a present, I’d gotten a little table and chairs. What other 16 year old boy would let his dad film him sitting on tiny chairs having an invisible tea-party with a three year old?
Proof!

I know my brother isn’t perfect by a long shot and neither am I, but we’re family. And we’re family that loves each other and cares. Even if we don’t agree with something that the other is doing, we still support their right to do it. There were a lot of memories that we talked over, and there was a lot of current stuff too. I think in the midst of some things I was unloading on him, he told me one of the best pieces of advice he ever gave me. He’s never been one to BS me and that’s probably one of the things I admire most about him. His honesty is raw and unrefined, and handed compassionately to me when I need it most.
He still seems to sense when I’m standing in the dark silently at the foot of his bed, willing the monsters to stay at bay until he wakes. This time he tells me what I need to hear most: “Just remember; you’re the baby, not a baby. And we come from the same place. You're doing fine."