of aggression, unyielding rage, shame, and fear. Or maybe I was just checking that the trapdoor was still there.
Thatâs what it felt like, back then, when it would surface. It doesnât anymore.
We didnât speak for months, and before I knew it, Dan had moved away from Seattle, deciding that heâd had enough and it was time to be closer to family in Texas. That drunken Sunday argument began the longest estrangement of our lives, which kept me from flying to Austin, to Derekâs bedside while he lay intubated.
I never knew how difficult it was to be brothers, never understood how it would overwhelm and inform every other relationship in my life as an adult, or how Iâd have to constantly reevaluate Dan every time Iâd see him, how much more complicated heâd become as what was basically a life-partner relationship in which I had no choice but to participate. We had unknowingly become overbonded from our childhood, both hating and needing one another in a cyclic rotation rooted deeply in the sort of love only POWs who help one another through death marches and the building of Burmese railroads can fathom. And we had no idea about the commitment; we ripped one another to shreds constantly as kidsâthen knew we had to make a reparative effort after, because neither one was going anywhere.
Itâs the hardest club, and the only club, in which Iâve had membership, and perhaps the reason why I find artificial associations like unions or fraternal orders calling one another âbrothersâ distasteful, even offensive.
It is a marriage, from birth to death, and it takes years to figure it out, to stop hurting one another and say, âWe have only a few years left, considering how weâve been living, and Iâm exhausted from fighting. Please, letâs get along better and enjoy only the love.â
Youâre not going to get that by âpledgingâ at a Greek house. Youâre not going to experience that by standing next to Bob at the plant for twenty years, working the swing shift, and sneaking off at 10:00 p.m. to slug down a six-pack of Milwaukeeâs Best in thirty minutes for lunch. You might get something very close to that in combat, as Iâve understood it, but itâs still not biologically imperative, still not the common threading of DNA, still not family.
Brotherhood, at its most elemental, is a shared psychosis, a folie à deux , an intimate social obligation based on genetics, overlapping damage and testosterone, and you do not have a choice except to participate. Even running away is a participation, as I experienced.
And by the time I figured out how to be a brother to Dan, when we had figured out how to de-escalate arguments and opinions, knew how to step wide, stay out of the mud and let the other person spray and be an asshole, knowing heâd be back around in a bit, and we finally figured out how to navigate our club of two, then we had Derek to deal with, who knew none of the codes, had none of our neurological wiring, had nothing in the way of potential to join, except that Dad was his father (we were pretty sure) and Mom was his mother, and he knew most of the same people we did. Knew a really good corn tortilla from a microwaveable one, so to speak.
This might actually explain why I went through a period where instead of collecting father figures, I switched to collecting little brothers. I would meet them at work or from my neighborhood, or at my old karate school, and I would adopt them for a while, then feel uncomfortable and weird, and then just leave them, never to talk again.
I missed Dan and Derek so much sometimes that it ached, profoundly, in my core sense of self, sense of family.
We had some great stories, as brothers.
With Derek, I remember visiting him on a vacation from Seattle, after Iâd started karate, and one perfect summer Saturday, three or four of his friends were visiting at our old house on
Thatâs what it felt like, back then, when it would surface. It doesnât anymore.
We didnât speak for months, and before I knew it, Dan had moved away from Seattle, deciding that heâd had enough and it was time to be closer to family in Texas. That drunken Sunday argument began the longest estrangement of our lives, which kept me from flying to Austin, to Derekâs bedside while he lay intubated.
I never knew how difficult it was to be brothers, never understood how it would overwhelm and inform every other relationship in my life as an adult, or how Iâd have to constantly reevaluate Dan every time Iâd see him, how much more complicated heâd become as what was basically a life-partner relationship in which I had no choice but to participate. We had unknowingly become overbonded from our childhood, both hating and needing one another in a cyclic rotation rooted deeply in the sort of love only POWs who help one another through death marches and the building of Burmese railroads can fathom. And we had no idea about the commitment; we ripped one another to shreds constantly as kidsâthen knew we had to make a reparative effort after, because neither one was going anywhere.
Itâs the hardest club, and the only club, in which Iâve had membership, and perhaps the reason why I find artificial associations like unions or fraternal orders calling one another âbrothersâ distasteful, even offensive.
It is a marriage, from birth to death, and it takes years to figure it out, to stop hurting one another and say, âWe have only a few years left, considering how weâve been living, and Iâm exhausted from fighting. Please, letâs get along better and enjoy only the love.â
Youâre not going to get that by âpledgingâ at a Greek house. Youâre not going to experience that by standing next to Bob at the plant for twenty years, working the swing shift, and sneaking off at 10:00 p.m. to slug down a six-pack of Milwaukeeâs Best in thirty minutes for lunch. You might get something very close to that in combat, as Iâve understood it, but itâs still not biologically imperative, still not the common threading of DNA, still not family.
Brotherhood, at its most elemental, is a shared psychosis, a folie à deux , an intimate social obligation based on genetics, overlapping damage and testosterone, and you do not have a choice except to participate. Even running away is a participation, as I experienced.
And by the time I figured out how to be a brother to Dan, when we had figured out how to de-escalate arguments and opinions, knew how to step wide, stay out of the mud and let the other person spray and be an asshole, knowing heâd be back around in a bit, and we finally figured out how to navigate our club of two, then we had Derek to deal with, who knew none of the codes, had none of our neurological wiring, had nothing in the way of potential to join, except that Dad was his father (we were pretty sure) and Mom was his mother, and he knew most of the same people we did. Knew a really good corn tortilla from a microwaveable one, so to speak.
This might actually explain why I went through a period where instead of collecting father figures, I switched to collecting little brothers. I would meet them at work or from my neighborhood, or at my old karate school, and I would adopt them for a while, then feel uncomfortable and weird, and then just leave them, never to talk again.
I missed Dan and Derek so much sometimes that it ached, profoundly, in my core sense of self, sense of family.
We had some great stories, as brothers.
With Derek, I remember visiting him on a vacation from Seattle, after Iâd started karate, and one perfect summer Saturday, three or four of his friends were visiting at our old house on
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