35th

Today is my brother's birthday... I haven't spoken with him in 8 years now and counting. When we were younger, we were the typical brothers... playing with each other all day and occasionally he would tease, isolate and torture me like older siblings do. I guess things went south around the time I started to become ill, around 15-16. We used to wrestle, like "the pros" from the days gone by. He would put me in the "Boston crab", "figure four", "the sleeper" and "scorpion death lock" and I would always use the same old submission tactic of the "scissor hold". One evening, as we wrestled, I began to "slip away" from reality and became extremely violent. We were raised in a VERY religious household... more of those nightmares another time... and when I became violent with him, he became extremely scared and started crying. He crawled away from me quoting scriptures, like we were drilled to do, and told me "I rebuke you, Satan, in the name of Jesus Christ!". I guess that was the trigger of my first of many psychotic breaks... I smiled at him and quoted a scripture back at him from Acts 19:15, "And the evil spirit answered and said, 'Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are you?' ". I remember crashing myself upon him and beginning to beat him to a pulp... the rest, I have no idea. I wasn't there. Needless to say, out relationship began to change... we no longer spent time together and grew apart. He continued to distance himself from the rest of the family, especially my Dad. Years later while at college, he had developed such a disdain for my Dad, that he had his name legally changed. He came to visit his friends back home once, during my hardcore drug abuse days, he came over to my house said hello and said we should visit later after I was done tripping. He never came back and I haven't seen him since. Eight years ago when I moved north, I had taken his car stereo and offered to buy it from him so I wrote him a letter and set up an arrangement. His reply was short and to the point... business as usual. After the deal was done, I guess so was our relationship. I miss those simple days of playing in the woods and playing Cowboys and Indians with my brother... I miss the laughter. I know he will never read this... more than likely no one will. But either way, I love you T.J. . Happy Birthday, Big Brother.