Our Brothers’ Keepers

My brother is exactly three years and one month younger than me. If I squeeze my eyes tight and try to remember my very earliest memory, it is of my dad holding me up to peer through a cloudy pane of Plexiglas at a smiling nurse holding my downy-headed brother. My second memory?  Waking up from an afternoon nap in tears because I had a dream (napmare?) about my little brother being “really sick”; of my mom holding my hand as we tiptoed through the blue and red nursery to peek at him peacefully dozing in his crib.

My entire cognizant life I have been an older sister. I would be lying to say that we never fought, that I never did anything cruel, that I never wished I was an only child. However, every single happy memory I have of my perfectly nuclear family of origin includes him. I suppose I thought he would be present for all of my happy adult memories too, but that is naive. He is an adult. He has his own life, a life of which we are just a teeny part, a life I cannot force him to share. The big sister in me wants to tell him what to do, to tell him to get his brilliant, snarky ass back in college, to not partake in nicotine, to call his mother. Do I want to be my brother’s keeper? It would appear so.

I met my brother-in-law almost seven years ago, of course he was not my BIL then, he was just J.

He was just emerging from a dark time in his adolescent years, and had come to live with his four year older brother, my adorable new boyfriend, to “get his life together”. The first night I was introduced to J the three of us talked for hours in their tiny, oh so gross, apartment. My big sister gene immediately kicked in. As The Husband and I got married and settled into our new matrimonial bliss, J would come over almost every day and camp out on our couch. By this time he was every bit as much my brother as JHJ. We moved towns; so did he. We still saw him several times a week while he was in school, he would be there anytime his brother wanted to have “guy” time, anytime he was sick of dorm food, anytime he missed us. I slowly, but surely, started to spend more time with my BIL than I did my brother…and I noticed. Did my brother? Is that when I stopped being a confidant?

Now that BIL and JHJ are both bona fide adults, they do not seem to need us as much. Or, they do not let us help as much; no more subsidizing emotionally, physically, financially as we once did. The Husband feels this loss as keenly as I do, he has the same “keeper” urges as I do, he loves them both every bit as much as I do. The worst part is that one of our brothers lives less than a mile away, but the span is the same. Miles or despondency, the results are equal. Both of these grown men do things that make The Husband and I want to bang our heads against the wall with irritation and consternation, do they feel that way about us? Is it a singularly elder sibling affliction?

When do you let them go? Have we waited too long? Do we wash our hands and act as though we are merely acquaintances with a shared past history? Do we spend Thanksgiving reminiscing and cordially asking to pass the potatoes? Is it too much to yearn for the relationships we once had, that of dare I say, friend? Is this part of those growing pains that should have happened to us in our teens? Did we both come from such close families that it makes the gulf smart all that much more? Is this an argument for a sibling for The Son, or against?

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In which Hey You learns not to hit send quite so fast.

I, like every single other heterosexual woman in America, think looking at swimmer Michael Phelps is better than a sharp stick to the eye.   In my daily jaunt around the blogosphere I happened across a lovely picture of Mr. Nine medals and counting.

I have a very, very good friend named Christi. I happen to know that she also is a heterosexual woman, so I sent her an email containing this picture of Michael. (Go ahead, click on it, but don’t lick the computer screen, I would hate to be responsible for any electrocuted tongues ((Oh, semi NSFW)).

I have another friend named Chris.  He is not a heterosexual female.  What he is, is a ultra-conservative Christian youth minister.  You know what two names are next to each other in my email address book? Christi and Chris.  Guess who I really emailed this speedo-licous picture?  Good guess.

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OlymPICS of the day!

Awesome! We can debate over money being better spent elsewhere, but it is quite a spectacle to see regardless of opinions.   Oh, and these girls are NOT 16. Your thoughts?

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Overheard in a HOSPITAL, you know where they have lives in their hands.

The Husband does geeky things to hospital computers when he is not at school or parenting or husbanding or doing church things.  We are all (knock on wood) fine.  Just wanted to explain why he was in a hospital.   Oh, and we here at thehuckablog are well aware that all nurses are not nitwits…but these were. Explanation over, post continued…..NOW!

Nurse 1: Well, I just got off the phone with my Daddy, I was so worried.

Nurse 2: Why? Is everything okay?

Nurse 1: I heard on the radio that Russia had invaded Georgia!  My Daddy lives in Atlanta, so I had to find out if he was okay.

Nurse 2: Wow! Was he okay? Was there a terrorist attack or something?

Nurse 1: Yeah it turns out there is a country in Africa or somewhere named Georgia, and that is who was attacked.

Nurse 2: Oh.  That is good news.

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Here Comes The Son

I get emails all the time asking why I call The Son, The Son instead of either using his real name or some sort of nick name. I think you already know why we refrain from using real names here, and I debated calling him Jelly Bean (his inutero name) or some other cute little descriptor, but there IS a reason behind why we use The Son. In fact, here on The Huckablog, The Son’s name came first and then The Husband, The Dog, The Neighbor all followed.

I was about eight months pregnant when The Husband and I sat down one night to complete the 10 page birthing plan homework given us by the hospital. We breezed through the majority of it, and most of it turned out to be null and void since I wound up having a c-section. One thing we really spent a long time thinking about was the music section. We had no idea you were supposed to have a soundtrack to play for your child’s birth. I always thought that you would hear, “OMYGOD GET HIM OUT NOW!!” during a birth, but our hospital wanted us to make certain we had CDs ready to play to “soothe and inspire” me. So the music… should it be Christian? Perhaps something uber soothing? A lullaby maybe? We finally narrowed it down to a burned CD with all of my favorite Beatles songs on repeat. They are our favorite band, it is something familiar, and it had one big bonus…Here Comes the Sun. I love this song, always have. The Husband was instructed to play it as soon as it was evident that our son, our little darling, would be born any second. This is what we wanted to hear underscored by a newborn’s cry.

So here is a fun O.R. factoid for you: the patient does not get to pick the music during surgery, the doctors do. What did my doctors choose? Well there was a debate between several that I cannot remember, ( Dude, I had been in labor for two weeks with no progression! Give me a break!) as a compromise they decided on Queen’s greatest hits. What did The Son hear when he joined us (finally)? Another One Bites the Dust. I kid you not.

Oh, well, best laid plans and all that. Here Comes the Sun is still one of my favorites, and it fits our son perfectly. He is a gleaming ball of fire. Warming wherever he goes, he could melt the iciest of hearts. And, he makes our lives so much brighter on even the darkest of days. Look out world…here comes The Son.

The Son from his first appearance up to his first birthday. Watch for our little darling’s year two coming soon.

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Good Idea, Bad Idea: the burnt to a crisp edition

Good Idea: Taking advantage of a beautiful morning to take your toddler to the beach at a local state park.

Bad Idea: Not checking the web to see when beach opens for swimming. (Noon)

Good Idea: Killing time until you can swim by making sandcastles.

Bad Idea: Thinking you can make sandcastles with an (almost) two year old for an hour and a half. (Actual attention span? 30 minutes, tops.)

Good Idea: Bringing a picnic from home to save money.

Bad Idea: Not bringing a back up lunch for when the first lunch gets dropped in the sand.

Good Idea: Waiting for the lifeguard to (FINALLY!) appear so you can swim without being fined.

Bad Idea: Waiting to swim until it is nap time, and the sun is at its burniest.

Good Idea: Applying a high SPF sunscreen.

Very, Very Bad Idea: Asking your (almost) two year old to apply sunscreen to the places you can’t reach.

Good Idea: Aloe and Advil

Bad Idea: Going anywhere that requires a bra. (Anywhere past the front door for me)

Note: This is not my actual back; that would require posting a picture of my naked back on the internet, and therefore is not going to happen. This is, however, a good representation of how my back looks. Except it has grill marks on it like the hamburgers from burger king. No pickles though.

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There are no words.

How can a child slip through our (society’s) fingers? Nothing funny today; instead we have an article to read. I can’t even be a little funny after this.

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